


Savage God

by LenneWithMilkAndHoney, PottersPink



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Divergence - Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America Big Bang 2019 | cabigbang, Digital Art, Embedded Images, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mixed Media, POV Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers Feels, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2019-11-15
Packaged: 2020-12-31 02:22:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 36,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21048260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LenneWithMilkAndHoney/pseuds/LenneWithMilkAndHoney, https://archiveofourown.org/users/PottersPink/pseuds/PottersPink
Summary: Past, present, future, Steve knows Bucky Barnes. It’s why he recognized him when he found him in that alley in April of 1942, even though Bucky was older, stronger, wearier; he called himselfThe Asset,and had ametal fucking arm.He flinched when Steve tried to touch him, and when Steve told him he loved him, his first response was to askwhy.The Asset was only with Steve in 1942 for a few days, but it’s enough to change the course of Steve’s life forever; the journey to becoming Captain America is coloured with urgency, with an undercurrent of fear and determination that in the end he just can’t manage to hide from everyone — But it was all for nothing. Steve saves Bucky from Zola, just to lose him on the train. Their second chance, wasted.Seventy years later, Steve wakes up in the twenty-first century, and he doesn’t know whether to be heartbroken or hopeful when some of the things Bucky revealed to him in 1942 start falling into place.





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> Months after first coming up with the idea, here is my first fic contribution in the MCU fandom!
> 
> Thank you to the mods for running the fest, you guys are all lovely!
> 
> For being such a great cheerleader & friend, thank you Penn! I will bug you later with more ideas that make much more sense in my head than they do on paper.
> 
> Thank you Lenne for being such an awesome collaborator; I am thrilled with the work you've done to bring my story to life!
> 
> And as always, thank you Peach, you wonderful person, you. I can't believe how lucky I am to have you as a friend. This fic wouldn't be what it is without your help.
> 
> From Lenne: Hi, everyone!! First, I want to thank my author for writing such an amazing story and for allowing me to do everything I wanted, no matter how crazy the final result might have looked like. I've been shivering non stop since I read the summary, so I hope all of you get as entranced by it as I am. And that you enjoy the art too!!

** **

**PROLOGUE**

❖

_ “After S. Mallarmé, after Verlaine, after G. Moreau, after Puvis de Chavannes, after our own verse, after the faint mixed tins of Conder, what more is possible? After us the Savage God.” _

  * William Butler Yeats

** _2012_ **

Alexander Pierce has never looked more dishevelled. After three consecutive days of questioning from Fury, Hill, and Natasha, Steve can concede that he’d probably be a little worn thin, too. Still, there is no room for sympathy here; Steve doesn’t even think he’d be able to _ try, _at this point. 

_ Seventy fucking years, Buck. _

They’ve been sitting in silence for nearly an hour, now. At first, Pierce had tried to goad him, to poke and prod and taunt, because he still looks at Steve and sees _ American symbol of Truth, Justice, and Family Values. _No one sees the soldier; the spy. It felt good to watch Pierce fade, to watch confusion start to line his face, not expecting the wall Steve makes of himself. 

"You know," he says finally, leaning forward in his chair and clasping his hands on the table between them. "A lot of people have asked me what was going through my head when I stepped into that tank in ‘43. I've read entire books dedicated to it. I've heard theories and speculation and none of them have even gotten close to the truth." 

“The truth,” he continues, holding Pierce’s gaze. “Is that when I stepped into that tank, I was thinking about finally being able to put a bullet between your eyes."

_ I am the end, before you’ve even begun. _

This is very obviously not what Pierce was expecting to hear. Neither, from the sudden way all noise coming from his comm seems to cease, is it what Fury and Hill expected. 

Pierce checks himself, face going slack in forced calm. "Execution isn't really your style, Cap."

Steve only smiles, all teeth; he’s high on satisfaction right now, something that is very nearly vindication, and he knows that a little bit of that slips through. It makes Pierce push back in his seat, the chain from his handcuffs pulling at where they’re locked on the table. 

“Where’d you read that, Pierce? Or — you know what? Tell me later. First, I want you to tell me about Project Eclipse, and I want you to tell me about Bucky.”

❖

** _1942_ **

Steve doesn’t usually have to stop at this particular alley; he always turns his head to check while walking by anyways, just in case someone is making trouble but being _ quiet _ about it, and nothing seemed to be amiss at first glance. But. _ But. _ There is something not right, a presence that makes the empty alley feel like it’s full to the brim with _ something. _Almost like there are a few more shadows than normal, maybe, like evening has come early. So Steve steps into the alley and squints his eyes at the darkness, strains his good ear for any noise, and then he sees him. 

“Bucky?” Which is odd, because Bucky’s gone for the week, took his little sisters upstate to visit their aunt and uncle. Steve steps closer, trying to get a better look.

His hair is longer and his shoulders wider, but the tilt of his head is familiar and when he turns to face Steve the motion is the same, left foot first, shoulders thrown back; there’s confidence in the swing of the movement, but it’s buried deep. When Steve meets his eyes the weight of them knocks the breath out of him. “Buck.”

He stares Steve down, tall and menacing and older, but still Bucky; Steve holds his hands up in front of him, palms open, tries to force calm into every step, and slowly walks forward. He eyes the contraptions — weapons? — on Bucky’s back, strapped to his arm, his thigh, his side, and they look like guns, but not like any Steve has ever seen before. It’s a good sign that Buck doesn’t reach for them immediately, even if there is still no light of recognition in his eyes. “Hey, sweetheart.”

The word makes Bucky fall back, flinching, and Steve freezes. The look on Bucky’s face makes Steve’s own heart rate pick up, just about ready to go haywire, his breath is catching on the edge of an attack, but louder than everything else Steve’s instincts are screaming at him to _ stay fucking calm _, and he’s going to do his fucking best. “You know where you are, Buck?”

“Brooklyn, April 13, 1942,” he answers immediately, but his voice is flat. It’s a fact, nothing more.

But it’s true, so, “Yeah, Buck. April 13, 1942. We’re in Brooklyn, and I was just heading back home. You wanna come with?” 

There’s a whirring noise coming from his arm, and Steve blanks — what he thought was just a sleeve made of reflective fabric is Bucky’s _ fucking arm and fuck Steve’s instincts that’s Bucky’s fucking arm — _ and he forces himself to take a deep breath, and then deeper, wills himself to ignore the way his eyes are stinging, and he shoves his panic down, down, _ down. _ He watches plates shift and realign, the fingers of Bucky’s left hand flex and clench into a fist, movement as smooth and fluid as a hand made of flesh. When he looks back to Bucky’s face, he sees that he’s breathing hard, looks like he’s on the edge of panic, but Steve doesn’t step into his space, waits patiently for Bucky to make his decision. 

“You know me,” Bucky says, and shifts, his body language still screaming _ I don’t fucking know what’s going on, _but his eyes are imploring Steve to come closer, so he does, without hesitating.

“Always, Buck.” Standing right in front of him, Steve doesn’t move his eyes from Bucky’s when he takes both of his hands in his own, not even when he feels the unforgiving, cold plates of his left hand. It’s a shock, but he holds tight, as tight as his bones allow him. “And you know me. Better than anyone.”

Bucky stares down at him, eyes glazed and brows furrowed. There’s a scar under his eye that Steve doesn’t recognize, and he untangles his hand from Bucky’s right to trace it with his finger. 

“Steve,” he says. “Stevie.”

“Yeah, doll,” Steve tucks a loose strand of hair behind Bucky’s ear. “Wanna come home with me?”

❖

It turns out that Bucky knows where they live, or the general location, at least — but they’re taking the long way back, through alleys and dark, hidden roads to get there, with Bucky tensing and reaching for his gun or knife at every strange noise. 

When a car backfires, cracking like a gunshot, Bucky is moving before Steve can follow; he’s pinned against the wall, Bucky’s arm whirring and the plates shifting like scales, an immovable weight against his chest. Bucky’s face is turned away from Steve, looking to the exit of the alley, but not really seeing it — out of nowhere, there’s a sheen of sweat covering Bucky’s visible skin. Steve tries to lift his arms to touch him, to get his attention, but Bucky’s forearm is long enough and Steve’s torso narrow enough that it’s pretty fucking useless. 

“Bucky,” he says, but Bucky isn’t listening, can’t listen, and then he’s pulling a gun out of its holster on his thigh, pointing it down the alley, using his metal arm to push and keep pushing Steve harder against the wall — _ “Bucky.” _

It’s only when Steve’s ribs begin to give under Bucky’s strength that he comes back to himself. Steve is halfway to an asthma attack and he knows that he’s going to be bruised for weeks, probably be wheezing for just as long, and he doubles over, hands on his knees when Bucky lets go of him. 

_ “Buck —” _he gasps, and looks up to see Bucky plastered to the far wall of the alley, breathing hard and eyes white with panic and fear. “Buck, it’s okay,” he says. Bucky hides his left arm behind his back, pressing harder into the wall. Steve gives a small sigh and amends, “Okay, pal, so it’s not great, but you got scared, right? Ya don’t really remember Brooklyn and that noise freaked you out so you slammed me into the wall like a big brute because you were tryin’ to protect me, right?” 

He hadn’t gotten a very good breath in before he started talking, so he’s finishing on a wheeze. He waits for a minute until he’s reasonably sure his lungs will cooperate with him before looking up again at Bucky. “Let’s wait a minute to just calm down, and we’ll start again, doll. We’re almost home.”

❖

Steve takes Bucky by the hand and leads him up the stairs, leads him into their small kitchen and sits him down in a chair. Since the episode in the alley, he’s been mostly unresponsive, eyes glazed and unseeing. Steve finds some bread in the cupboard, finds some soup from Mrs. Dobson and goes to reheat it on the stove. He keeps an eye on Bucky the whole time, but he doesn’t move an inch, not even a twitch of his finger. 

He sets a steaming bowl of soup and bread in front of Bucky, pushes it closer. When it seems as though he still doesn’t notice, Steve softly calls his name. “Buck?” 

His movement is sluggish, but when his eyes flicker, there’s awareness there now that wasn’t present before. “Can you eat?” Steve asks.

He looks down to the food in front of him, seemingly noticing it for the first time. He takes the spoon clumsily in hand and begins to slurp, noisily — were it just hours earlier, it would have annoyed Steve to no end, and he would’ve been vocal about it; now, it only unnerves him. It’s clear that Bucky _ knows _ Steve, but he doesn’t _ remember _ him, and at this point, Steve is way past being annoyed by something as minor as soup slurping.

“Hey doll, slow down — you’re going to burn yourself,” Steve says, reaching forward to touch his fingers to Bucky’s wrist. Bucky flinches, and at first Steve thinks it’s from his touch, but — “Sweetheart?” he tries, hoping he’s wrong.

But he twitches again. Steve sits back, guilt roiling in his gut. “Sorry, Buck, do you not want me to call you that?”

He works his jaw, looking not quite nervous but _ unsure, _and eventually he answers with a question of his own. “Why do you call me those things?”

Steve knows rage, knows rage like it’s a person, an old friend, but this is something just a little deeper, a little hotter. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “You know those words, Buck?”

There’s a flicker of something that looks like irritation in Bucky’s eyes, a narrowed look that Steve knows says _ fuck you I’m not an idiot, _ but it’s gone as quickly as it came. He nods.

“I call you doll and sweetheart because that’s who you are, to me. You’re my best guy.”

“... I’m the Asset. _ Zimniy soldat _ _ . _ ” The way he says it, there’s a _ But _at the beginning of the sentence.

_ What have they done to you, Buck? _ “Before you were — _ the Asset, _ and while you’re the Asset, and _ after _ you’re the Asset, you’re still Bucky. You’re James Buchanan Barnes, my best guy, and sometimes I call you doll because I’m sweet on you and I love you more than anyone else in the world.”

Bucky blinks owlishly at him. _ “Why?” _

Steve smiles sadly at him across the table. “I’ll tell you a story, Buck. But it’s a long one — starts all the way back in 1925.”

❖

Bucky has been with him for two days now; they haven’t left the tenement.

He is curled up next to Steve on the bed, but the only contact between them is where the top of Bucky’s head touches Steve’s thigh. Occasionally, Steve will reach down to comb his fingers through his hair, but he always has to exaggerate his movements; he’s learned that Bucky is easily stressed by touch. “Bucky, sweetheart? Tell me something?” 

He looks up at Steve, and he can’t help but think about how different Bucky is, but also how similar. He’s been destroyed and made new and destroyed again. “Yes,” Bucky says. 

“How did you get here?” Steve is making shit up in his head, but no matter how much of an artist he is, Bucky is the one with the imagination, and nothing Steve can come up with gets close to explaining this. “You’re older, is all.”

Bucky frowns up at him, like he’s thinking. “Project Eclipse,” he answers, finally. 

“Whassat?” But Bucky only shakes his head. “That’s ok, that’s alright.”

They sit in silence a little longer, until the thought just won’t leave Steve alone, not until he asks. He _ has _ to ask. “Can you tell me who’s hurting you?”

He keeps his hands in his lap, but all he really wants to do is reach out and hold Bucky, to smooth his hair back and comfort him. 

Bucky shudders, folding in on himself, pulling away from him, and Steve regrets asking, cursing his own selfishness, because of _ fuckin’ course _ Bucky wouldn’t want to think about the people who’ve hurt him.

_ Just one name. One person that will know when Steve Rogers looks them in the eye it’ll be the last thing they ever see. _

“No, I — I can’t, Stevie.”

He sighs. “Please?”

Bucky looks away, body a line of tension. “Why?”

“Because I’ll find them, and bring you home. Wherever you are, Buck, _ wherever you are, _ I promise I’m going to bring you home. Wherever that takes me, it’s not the end of the line ‘til we’re both at home and safe, Buck.”

Something flashes behind Bucky’s eyes, and he stares at Steve with something like wonder in his eyes. “You mean that.”

“‘Course I do, Buck. You’re my best guy. I’d burn the world for you,” _ and it looks like I just might have to _, “and then burn it again, because I whoever I’m dealing with? Fuck them.”

Bucky sits up, eyes travelling down from his face to his chest and then his arms, lays his hand over the irregular beat of Steve’s heart. He meets his gaze. “You would,” he says. And then something settles in him, and Bucky relaxes completely in Steve’s arms. “You _ do. _”

He lifts his head and brushes his lips against Steve’s cheek, whispering a name in his ear. 

❖

Bucky is gone the next morning, leaving only a note on the kitchen table. 

_ You burn the world, Stevie. _

_ But no one can ever know. _

❖

And Bucky comes back on Saturday, just like he told Steve he would — young and carefree and safe and with his two little sisters tucked under his arms, laughing. Samantha gives Steve a crate full of vegetables and herbs from their aunt and uncle’s farm, and Becca hands him a small bouquet of flowers, face flushed pink. Steve takes them from her with an over-the-top _ for me?!, _which makes her giggle and turn an even deeper shade of red. 

While Sami teases Becca, Bucky looks over their heads to meet Steve’s gaze. His eyes crinkle with his smile, his body losing tension. _ Heya, sweetheart, _he mouths.

Steve smiles back, hoping it’s not written on his face that he’s already wondering how much longer they have left. 

_ Welcome home, Buck. _

❖

“Hey, Buck,” Steve whispers, and pokes him in the ribs. “You awake?”

Bucky groans and rolls onto his side, pulls Steve close and tucks him under his chin. “Wha’re you thinkin’bout, Stevie?” he asks, and sighs. 

Steve wraps his arms around Bucky, holding tight. He kisses the bare skin he can reach, under his jaw and down his throat; Bucky runs his hands down Steve’s back. “I wanna marry you, Buck.”

Bucky freezes, seemingly shocked into silence. “Oh, doll,” he says, gathering Steve up even closer, shifting so that he’s on his back and Steve is glued from head to toes to Bucky’s side. “Wouldn’t that be something?”

“Just want everyone to know you’re mine. That I’m yours.” 

Bucky hums, and tips Steve’s face towards his with a touch under his chin. He leans in and kisses him, slow and deep and content; tension Steve didn’t know he had melts away and he sighs as Bucky moves away from his lips to kiss his cheeks, and then his nose, and his forehead, and keeps going until Steve is laughing and sputtering for him to _ stop, Buck, oh my gods, you’re such a fucking sap — _

“Better?” he asks, combing his fingers through Steve’s hair. “You always get so maudlin when you’re thinkin’, punk.”

Steve sighs, laying his head back down on Bucky’s chest. “’m better. Still wanna marry you, though. Officially.”

Bucky yawns and runs his hand down Steve’s back, soothing. “Well, doll, the future’s a big place. Who knows what it’ll bring?” 

❖

Bucky gets drafted, and Steve knows what the future will bring.

❖

** _1943_ **

When he meets Dr. Erskine, Steve thinks that this is finally it. He can finally follow Bucky to the front, can finally start to keep his promise. 

So he waits and he watches and he trains; he’s nearly swept off his feet by Peggy Carter, the way she can command a room and the way she punches Hodge into the dirt. She’s got a sharp eye and sharper wit, and they make fast friends. She takes extra time to train Steve, help him slowly build up his strength and learn how to take down people bigger than him.

It’s late in the evening, long after everyone else has gone home and the only sounds to be heard in the entire building are Peggy’s sharp orders and the pounding of Steve’s fists against her boxing pads; they’ve been at it for a long time — a long time for Steve’s asthmatic lungs, anyhow — and Steve is starting to get distracted. Peggy lowers her hands and glares at him. 

“You’re not _ seeing _ me, Steve. You need to be focused on _ now, _ not later.”

Steve laughs, breathless and a little rueful. It’s funny because it’s true, he really isn’t focused on _ now, _ because it’s _ later _ that matters. It slips out before he can stop himself. “It’s hard not to, when the future’s paid you a visit.”

Peggy is silent in front of him, and when Steve lifts his head to look at her, she’s watching him with a serious expression on her face. “Was it a bad visit?”

Steve ducks his head. “It was a joke, Pegs,” he tries.

“Steve,” she says, somber. “Do we lose?” 

“No,” Steve says. “I don’t know.” Even if he did know, that would be thing number one _ not to say. _ And more than that, more than the war and the world and the burning he wants to say _ but _ I _ lose. I lose Bucky. And Bucky loses everything. _

She seems to know, anyway, because she comes forward and takes his hands in hers, eyes shining with a fierce light. “What do you need?”

“Teach me,” he says. “Teach me how to destroy someone from the inside.”

❖

When Dr. Erskine approaches him about participating in Project Rebirth, he remembers the way Bucky’s eyes travelled across his chest, tracing a shape larger than himself. _ You burn the world, Stevie. _

“Yes,” he says, ignoring the way Peggy’s stare bores into him. “Please. I want to help.” 

❖

Peggy pulls him aside later, glaring at him so hard he considers the benefits of sinking into the earth. 

“I want to help, Pegs. I really, honestly do.”

“But you have another motive. Colonel Phillips might not see it, but I _ know _ you and you’re not subtle. Does this have something to do with your training?”

She could be referring to his _ actual _ training, when Peggy trains him in fighting, in firearms, in strategy and disguise, everything he would need to be an undercover agent for the SSR. But _ your training _ is also Peggy’s codeword for Steve’s _ visit; _that first time was his only slip, and no matter how much she digs, Steve can’t bring himself to tell her any details. 

So instead he tells her, "I need to get there somehow, Pegs, and this body won't get the job done."

“But we don’t know if it will even _ work, _ Steve,” she hisses. “What if it kills you first? It’s all still completely experimental!” 

_ You burn the world, Stevie. _“No. It’s gonna work, Peggy. I know it will.”

❖

When he pulls Bucky off that table, the relief he feels is not a weight from his shoulders, or a breath of fresh air; it’s _ bone-crushing _ and world-changing, because he’s altered the course of history — but he’s holding Bucky, not _ The Asset, _ and he’s alive and he _ remembers. _“I’m going to take you home, Buck,” he whispers, and Bucky sighs against his lips and what is retying the strings of fate compared to that? 

They leave the factory behind, and from the edge of the forest Steve watches it burn and burn _ and burn. _

❖

** _1945_ **

“Bucky,” he says, and the world is quiet around them, as if they’re not suspended over hundreds of feet of ice and snow and there isn’t gunfire behind them; his heart is breaking because he thought he _ fixed it _, he thought he changed it for the better, and of course a punk from Brooklyn like Steve wouldn’t be able to do any good, even with a second chance, probably not even with a third, because it looks like he’s only made things worse —

“Bucky, _ sweetheart, _” and Bucky looks up at him, because even with Death counting down the minutes, a secret’s a secret, especially one of this kind, but Steve has to tell him, has to apologize somehow, has to make sure that he knows — 

“No matter what happens, Buck, I love you. You hear me? I love you. I love you, and I’m going to bring you home. ‘Til the end of the line.”

It calms something in both of them, to hear the words, even if they’re not true; as Bucky falls his eyes never leave Steve’s, not until he disappears in the snow and Steve is carried away, and he’s never been further away from home. 

❖

“It wasn’t your fault, Steve.” It’s barely above a whisper, but she knows Steve can hear her just fine. 

“Sure it was,” he replies. “Did you know I can’t get drunk?”

Peggy slides into the seat across from him and takes the glass from his grip. “Dr. Erskine hypothesized that the serum would affect your tolerance. It was a possibility.”

Steve sniffs, turning away when Peggy’s face starts to blur. “What good is that?”

“But you saved James, Steve. You _ did. _ I might not know from what, but that you did all of this, for him? You _ saved him.” _

Did he? Maybe. _ It sure as Hell doesn’t feel like it. _It feels like he’s been turned inside out, every thought and nerve and vulnerability once buried brought to the front, exposed, and he’s teetering on the edge, waiting to burn.

❖

When Steve realizes that there’s no other way to stop the bombs from hitting the East Coast, it’s a relief.

_ Bucky would kill me for thinkin’ like that. _He drops into the seat of the Valkyrie, lays the SHIELD down next to him, and turns on the radio.

“...Peggy?” 

_ “Yes, Steve, I’m here. Where are you? I’m going to try and find you some safe coordinates to land.” _

“Peggy. You can’t. You know you can’t.”

_ “Steve —” _

“It’s okay, Pegs. You know — you know it’s ok.”

The other end of the line is silent, until — _ “There could still be a chance, Steve.” _

“This was my second chance, Peggy.”

He thinks she sniffles on the other end of the line, but it’s hard to tell through the static of the radio. _ “I probably would have lost my patience with your two left feet, anyhow.” _

Steve feels the corners of his lips lift in a smile, warmth curling in his chest, glad that she has the heart to tease him, even now, even while there’s grief settling in like it’s found a home in his bones. “You sure you don’t want a raincheck?”

_ “You’re going home, Steve. No need to reschedule for me.” _

He’s never been able to fool Peggy, and he doesn’t think he’d ever be able to, even if they somehow lived to be 90 years old and couldn’t see past their noses, couldn’t hear anyone shouting in their ears or even remember their own names. But, “Stay a little longer, Pegs?”

_ “Of course, Steve.” _ Steve doesn’t know for how long their connection lasts, because neither of them have anything else to say; Steve sits back and watches the ocean’s fast approach, and before he hits the surface he closes his eyes, thinking of home.

**GODS EXIST** ** **

❖

** _2011_ **

Awareness comes slowly; first, it’s the feeling of smooth cotton under his palms. He’s not covered with a blanket, and he’s fully dressed — shirt, pants, boots. There’s a low noise somewhere to his right, a voice muffled by the tell-tale static of the radio, a male announcer cheering for — _ the Dodgers are tied, 4-4. _ _ And the crowd well knows that with one swing of his bat, this fellow’s capable of making it a brand-new game again. Just an absolutely gorgeous day here at Ebbets Field — _

_ 1941\. That’s a game from 1941, and I’m Steve Rogers. I’m Captain Steve Rogers. _ Images flash through his mind like a whirlwind, cold flooding his veins like a phantom pain. _ Ice. There was so much fucking ice. _

_ So what am I doing here? _ Steve should be dead. At the thought, there’s a hot twist of _ something _ in his chest, tucked away deep enough that he doesn’t have to give it a name, ( _ Longing, regret, grief. Longing, longing, longing.) _ but Steve can’t deal with that just yet He keeps his breath even and pushes his shoulders back into the mattress, forcing himself to relax. The room is too quiet, broadcast aside, and there is no way that Steve _ isn’t _ being monitored. 

He takes another few minutes to assess what he can with his eyes closed; it’s not red, but black from behind his eyelids. It doesn’t have the harshness of artificial light, so Steve assumes it must be daytime. The air in the room is moving — strangely. He can tell that the ceilings are high, and that there must be an open window nearby, but the quality of it isn’t right. The air is stale and dry. There are too many contradictions.

_ There is something wrong. _

He opens his eyes slowly, and is met with a white ceiling. White walls and too clean white floors — and an open window, giving him a view of the Brooklyn skyline. 

All of it is wrong. 

All at once, Steve is filled with the strongest desire to just _ not be here. _ He folds in on himself, allows a numbness like ice to fill him until it forces all of his panic and fear and grief into a tight little box. _ Bury it deeper and deeper and deeper. _ Whatever is waiting for him outside of this room can’t be good. He doesn’t know where he is, but it’s definitely not New York, and he doesn’t know if it’s been hours or days or weeks or _ months, _ and — _ I should be dead. _

_ Does it matter? _

_ It could, _ he thinks, a little hysterical. _ It could matter. _ Maybe it really is 1941, maybe whatever power that had decided to send Bucky to him in ‘42 thought that Steve could have another chance, could try again, just differently, this time — 

The door opens and a — _ nurse? — _ steps into the room. Everything jumps back into focus, dropping Steve fully back into his body without much grace. Everything about her is wrong, and Steve feels his small thread of hope unravel. _ There is no third chance, Rogers. _

Steve sits up to get a look at the woman, swinging his legs over the side of the bed, planting his feet on the floor. Suspiciously solid, no slight give or echo. _ I’m on the ground? _

“Captain Rogers.” And something about the way she says his name is also wrong, just a little too forced, and he’s immediately on edge. She doesn’t sound German, and she’s wearing the right uniform, but it’s obvious that she’s not comfortable in it; her hair is a little too old fashioned for someone so young, and her shoes are just a little too high to be practical. “Good morning,” she smiles, and checks her watch. “Or should I say afternoon?”

“Where am I?” Jumping immediately to asking questions isn’t what he was planning on doing. The smart thing to do would have been to let her talk, wait and see what information she’d give willingly, unknowingly, but the shock of the nurse — _ agent, most likely _ — stepping into the room, the way everything keeps showing up _ wrong, _is making him panic. He catalogues every shift in her body, the way she leans on her right hip, the tilt to her head, the small, thin wire coming out from her ear and woven into her hair. 

“You’re in a recovery room, in New York. You’ve been resting for some time.”

“Is that so,” he says, outwardly unfeeling, inwardly reeling. “It’s awful quiet for New York.” He says, head tilting towards the open window. He can tell that is non-reaction is throwing her off, and her smile becomes slightly forced. 

“Is there anything that you need, Captain?”

“What year is it, agent?” 

She freezes, caught off guard. “Excuse me, Captain?” 

“You heard me, agent. What year is it?”

She stares at him some more, and Steve can hear a voice coming through the wire in her ear. He doesn’t bother straining to hear the actual words. “It’s the year 2012, Captain.”

_ Two thousand and fucking twelve. Ain’t that a real goddamn humdinger? _ While Steve just wants to sink right into the mattress underneath him, he only lets her see the way his shoulders drop in surprise — it’s honest, what she is probably expecting of him, because that’s 67 years he’s missing; the grief and the regret and the longing are raging just under the surface, just out of reach, and he grasps for the closest mask he can find. _ You’re Captain America, now. No one here will know any better. _

“Is that so,” he says again, breathless. 

She eyes him warily, as if maybe he’ll snap and go nuts or something, and Steve can’t really blame her. _ I try to save Bucky and I end up in a place where no one probably even knows his fucking name. _

❖

The Retreat is a box. It’s a box with a kitchen and a living room and a bathroom and a bedroom and Steve is going to lose his goddamn mind. It’s a small log-cabin in the middle of a forest in the middle of bum-fucking nowhere. 

His days go like this: he drags himself out of bed before noon, because he spends most of the night going over every single thing he did from the moment he found Bucky in that alley to the moment he fell, sights and scents and sounds and physical sensations all included because the serum decided that perfect recall of any moment in his life would be an asset and not something that would drive him completely fucking insane. 

He’ll eat something from the pantry because he can’t ever dredge up the energy to cook while Bucky’s screams replay in his mind, and then once he finishes his food he’ll go outside and run laps until he can’t think anymore. 

The binders he’s supposed to go through from SHIELD are opened once; after reading them all through, he bloodied his knuckles from hitting a tree too many times. They’re labeled with things like, _‘America in the Second Half of the Twentieth Century’,_ _‘The Rise of Technology in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries, ’ _and _‘History of SHIELD’. _The most memorable is one titled more politely but may as well have been called _‘Things Someone Who was Raised in the Twenties Might Think is ok to Say but is VERY MUCH NOT OK TO SAY NOW.’ _Besides that last one, which Steve does find informative but also downright patronizing, they’re all just piles of pages filled with words and words and more words that mean absolutely nothing because there is no global context. There is no prior information, no experience Steve can fall back on to even _begin_ to try and understand the mess described to him in those pages. 

He just can’t believe how _ biased _they are.

Where are the histories of other countries? It seems as though America boomed after the war, but what about Europe? What happened to those war-torn countries Steve left behind? He remembers carrying children on his shoulders, remembers the way they laughed even though only hours before the town they lived in had been occupied by the Germans. How did they grow up?

Why is it _ these _ things that matter, and _ only _these things? What is so special about America, in a world so large? 

Why would they think that _ America _ would matter to Steve, when _ Bucky _ had always been enough?

_ It’s because I’m Captain fucking America, that’s why. I didn’t bury myself in ice out of grief, I sacrificed my life to save America. _

There is so much that went so horribly wrong in the past sixty-six years. So much death. _ How much of that is because of me? _

Peggy would probably smack him upside the head if she could hear the way he was thinking, and in the back of his mind even _ he _ knows that it would be the only the most incredible arrogance to think that his actions were the force that shaped the second half of the twentieth century, but time travel is tricky, isn’t it? Time travel in a _ world war. _How many minute details snowballed into something huge? What did he change, by running into Dr. Erskine the night before Bucky shipped out? 

Or maybe nothing changed, and Steve was always meant to end up here, alone. _ Be the catalyst, or be nothing at all. _

He doesn’t know which one is worse.

❖

The quiet of this place unnerves him. Nearly seventy years later and it was only four days ago that Steve crashed the Valkyrie into the ice. Only ten days since Bucky fell from the train.

It’s not something anyone around Steve talks about, but it’s not really their fault; the war is so far behind them. Some of the agents Steve has interacted with couldn’t have even been forty, yet, just young enough that they’d be the same age as any grandchildren Steve might have had, once upon a time. So it’s not their fault. They thought that moving him from the ice to a fake little Brooklyn box to an isolated box in the woods would maybe help him adjust, but not even two weeks ago he knew that Bucky was safe and warm because he was sleeping next to Steve and now he’s been lost for seventy years and _ it’s all Steve’s fault but no one can know — _

_ You burn the world, Stevie. _

And Steve _ wants _ it to burn, he wants it _ all to burn, _ because it’s not fair and Bucky isn’t here and what the fuck was the point of it all if Bucky came back to _ tell _him but then died anyways? 

❖

“Welcome back, Cap,” Director Fury says. “I trust you had a nice vacation?”

_ Vacation, _ Steve thinks. _ Is that what they’re calling it? _

Nick Fury puts him on edge. 

He’s a man that makes a show of holding all his cards close to his chest, but has another hand or two or three tucked away hidden in his pocket. He’s just layer upon layer of secrets, and while Steve understands how this man would be a good choice to leave a world-class protection agency to, he’s having a hard time trusting him.

As they walk through the SHIELD building — Steve notices the people just on the edge of his sight, interns looking at their phones or flipping through documents but who all have guns holstered and hidden under their jackets — Fury gives Steve a spiel about getting back into the fight, about how now that he’s adapted to the twenty-first century he can start aiding worthy causes — such as _ The Avengers Initiative _. A group of highly trained individuals that are not all entirely human, working together as a team to protect Earth. 

_ What the fuck. _

Steve is still trying to process the _ ‘now that you’ve adapted to the twenty-first century’ _ bit, because, what the hell, he’s been in the _ Bum-Fucking Nowhere Box _ for the past month, he’s barely even _ seen _ anything of the twenty-first century yet, when he catches back onto what Fury is saying to him. 

“There are some things you’d probably find hard to believe, Cap. There are beings and powers that exist now that would make you think you’d gone insane,” Fury told him.

At first, Steve worries that Fury _ knows, _ that he knows about the time travel and Steve’s true motivations and _ Bucky, _ that he’ll say something like _ this is your third chance, Cap, why won’t you use it, _ but when the words play out in his head, it’s his own voice, twisted, angry, guilty — _ because it’s my fault, it’s all my fault — _

“ — there are gods that roam the earth now, Captain. Aliens, magic, things you’d never even come close to seeing back in your day.”

Steve just stares at Fury, careful not to let the disbelief _ (nor the relief) _ he feels show on his face. _ Do they forget what I _ am? _ Do they not remember that I’ve fought monsters, that I’ve seen what magic and science can do when men are mad with power? _

He can’t help but laugh, low and a little hysterical, and Fury gives him a strange look. _ What do they know? What do _ any of them _ know? _

“Something funny, Captain?” Fury asks, suspicious.

Steve only shakes his head, rueful. “Of course gods exist, Fury. If they didn’t, I would have been left in peace.”

❖

Agent Romanoff says she’s been assigned to help Steve get around the twenty-first century, but Steve knows a handler when he sees one. 

“Now that you’ve read the books, it’s time for the practical stuff,” she tells him with a smile. It’s full of knives. “Also, there’s no need to be so formal. You can call me Natasha.” 

She’s one of the most beautiful women Steve has ever seen, poised and confident in her cheap plastic chair like it’s a throne. She tilts her head this way and that when she talks, knowing where every lightsource in the room is located to catch her red hair just so. It’s practiced and elegant and deadly.

“One of Fury’s _ Avengers, _ are you?” Steve is quite confident that he’s right; he’s known about the Initiative for a whole two days, but of all the agents that have come to gawk at Steve none of them have ever come off as something _ more. _

She freezes in a way that makes him suddenly aware that she had been _ moving, _which only further solidifies the thought that she’s probably one of the most dangerous people he’s ever met. Her gaze is sharp, but when she smiles at him now it’s not meant to be a weapon. It’s smaller, closed-lipped; Steve wonders if it could even maybe be genuine. 

“Well, I suppose we just lost the game,” she says, and Steve gets the impression that she’s laughing him. “Pun intended.”

Steve doesn’t really understand, but gets the feeling that Natasha doesn’t really care about that. When she stands to lead him out of the room, he follows.

❖

It’s time for Steve to be taken to his new apartment, apparently. “SHIELD issued, of course. You don’t have to worry about paying rent or anything like that. Also, congratulations, you’re rich.”

Steve makes a double take. “What?”

“Seventy years of back-pay works out to be quite the pile of cash.”

“How much is that?” 

“Approximately five million.”

Steve sputters as Natasha uses her hip to open the door into SHIELD’s lobby. _ Five million? _It’s hard to wrap his head around such as abstract number, but it’s a welcome distraction as he walks through the open hall. He can feel eyes following him everywhere, and he does his best to ignore the way people start to whisper as soon as he should be out of earshot, if not for the serum. He holds back a sigh, turning to ask Natasha why they had to walk through the lobby and not just go all the way downstairs to the garage, but when he looks, most of her face is covered by a pair of large sunglasses and she’s holding out a ballcap and some aviators to Steve.

“Mind if we take a stroll, Captain?” she asks, her mouth pulling up in the corner. 

_ No, not at all. _Steve takes the hat and glasses. “If I’m calling you Natasha, you can call me Steve.”

She blows a bubble with her gum, which, _ when did she start chewing bubblegum?, _and smirks at him. She holds the door open for him, and gestures for him to step outside. “After you, then, Steve.”

They make their way down the crowded street, no one sparing them a glance. Everyone is busy looking at their phones or at the ground or just at no one at all, just trying to squeeze through the crowd to get to where they need to be without having to interact with anyone.

It’s a little overwhelming.

He keeps an eye on the street and an eye on Natasha; it’s really the first time that he’s been able to walk around among the people of New York, and no matter how loud Peggy’s voice gets in his head _ (You need to keep your eyes _ open, _ darling, no daydreaming. _ Look. _ Tell me what the person at your four o’clock is wearing), _he wants to enjoy it.

Over everything, though, he hears the snap of Natasha’s gum. Out of the corner of his eye, he watches the way she moves through the crowd with the confidence of someone who knows she’ll remain completely invisible. Steve tries to think of things from his own training that he can fall back on, help him blend in like she is, but the problem with being stuck in The Bum-Fucking Nowhere Box is that he has no idea where to start in disguising himself. He’s wearing khakis and a button down shirt under a leather jacket, but that’s because that’s what he was given. 

The clothes are all high-quality, nicer than a lot of things he wore just up until a few years ago (half a century ago) but they feel cheap in his hands. They feel like a costume. They feel like _ hey, let’s get you assimilated into the twenty-first century, but wear these articles of clothing that no one actually wears anymore. You’ll stick out like a sore fucking thumb. _

The more he reads about _ Captain America, _ the more he realizes that most people know jack shit. No one is ever rude or pushy or dismissive, but they’re shallow. Steve is a character come to life; America’s muse, painted with the careful brushstrokes of conservative family values. No one wants Stevie Rogers, not when they can have Captain America. _ I wonder what they’d do if they knew I was a socialist. _

_ I wonder what they’d do if they knew about Bucky. _

Steve still hasn’t really gotten his feet under him yet. No one really knows who he is but it seems like they think they know everything about him, and on one hand it’s like a punch in the gut, but on the other it’s a gift. Let Steve try and settle in New York on his own for a moment, let him figure out how he’s going to play the game before he’s thrust back into society head first — or, at least before they sit him down across from a therapist like one nameless agent promised him they would.

_ Well, it’s as good a cover as any, I suppose. _

❖

Steve’s apartment is modest, bare, utilitarian. It’s no better than his little temporary one, really. The colours are muted and mostly neutral, and there is not a speck of dust on any surface. It’s a fancy hotel room bugged to the max, but Steve can’t let on he knows so he takes deep breaths as all the hair on the back of his neck stands on end while showing himself around. He doesn’t think that there’s a video feed, but he doesn’t doubt that someone will always be listening. They didn’t even try to make it look a _ little _ lived in, to make it look like they didn’t just spend two days building this place like some set from his USO tours. The thought makes him squirm, reminds him a little too much of the journey he took to get to Azzano, of the way he jumped through all of those hoops and sang and danced just to fail in the worst way. 

_ Is this all that’s left for me? _A life of being stuck in the past while being dragged through the future. Moving from one box to another box to another box, jumping through hoops all the way, until eventually he’ll be put in a pine one.

He sighs, shaking his head. _ How futile. _ And then he laughs, because, _ how fucking dramatic. _ His hands begin to shake as a familiar feeling of phantom cold rushes through his veins — he drops onto the couch in the living room, leaning back and closing his eyes. This future — _ his _ future — stretches endlessly in front of him. 

He hasn’t had the strength to look up the others. Dernier and Dum Dum and Gabe and Monty and Morita. Peggy. How did they live their lives? How did they leave them? Steve hopes that they all managed to find happiness after the war. He hopes that Dernier found his sister and that Gabe married his sweetheart and that Morita reunited with his family. He hopes, with a twisted, broken heart, that they’re all already gone. That they won’t have to see him like this. 

He looks out the window, and in the distance sees the Brooklyn skyline that was once home but isn’t anymore, stands in the entrance of this place that smells a little like cleaning supplies and is completely void of life, and knows that no one will ever be here to greet him when he comes home, that there will be no one for Steve to be anxious to see at the end of the day. 

_ They really did just expect a soldier ready to follow orders. The perfect soldier. _

_ No one wants the man, I suppose. _

**SMALL WORLD**

❖

Steve’s days are monotonous. There are still days that he struggles to get out of bed — _ most days, you punk, _a voice whispers in the back of his mind, fond and loved and missed — and there are still nights he’ll spend six hours going through punching bags trying to drown out the sound of twisting metal and wind and ice and screams. 

There are days where he’ll get up and try something different, maybe some new, foreign dish at the small restaurant down the street, or spend some time on youtube listening to some music from decades he’s missed. Art from the second half of the twentieth century is crap, in his own humble opinion, but he still visits the MoMA and the MET and all of the small independent galleries spread out around town; he looks up upcoming exhibitions. The accessibility to the world of art — past, present, future — is the first thing to grab Steve’s attention in a good way in a long time. 

Natasha likes to show up unannounced to take him out for things like _ laser-tag _ or _ axe-throwing _ or _ cat-cafes. _ The first time Natasha makes him watch the _ Troll _ series, he thought it was a joke; by the third time, he resigns himself to the fact she has horrible taste in movies.

There are days and then there are weeks and then months. On March 24, almost five months since Steve woke up, he’s ready to know what happened to everyone. 

Most of the Howlies passed away less than a decade ago. It’s bittersweet. 

When he looks up _ Agent Margaret Carter _he doesn’t find a date of death. He finds contact information for a nursing home down in Washington, DC.

❖

So now Steve is angry. It’s a different kind of anger, this time around; it’s one that doesn’t leave him beating up punching bags for hours on hours, but one that leaves him quiet, _ seething — _he’s angry at the agents that circle his apartment and he’s angry at himself. Maybe they thought he would have looked it up earlier, maybe they thought that he knew but just didn’t care; maybe they just all hoped that he wouldn’t ask, because who wants to be the one to tell him that everyone he loved and cared for is dead or dying? 

_ Well, if no one wanted to deal with that teeny tiny fucking problem, then they shouldn’t have fucking woken me up. _

He wonders if there were any people who were opposed to waking him up, or if everyone just thought he’d love to defrost the SHIELD and rehearse his USO lines because _ Get up and get going, Cap, the twenty-first century needs you. _

Steve sighs. _ Fuck. _

He waits on the line as he calls the home that Peggy’s living in and doesn’t react right away when a smooth, female voice picks up on the other end saying _ Rosewood Nursing Home, this is Emily speaking. _

“Hi,” he says, stomach doing a nauseating _ swoop _ at the word _ nursing. _“Would I be able to speak to Peggy Carter?”

❖

Steve is packed for a three-day trip to DC within an hour of calling the nursing home. He shrugs his bag onto his shoulder and locks his door behind him, opening his phone as he goes down the stairs. He opens a private browser to look up rental cars and makes sure he has all of the identification he’ll need ready to go. He looks at his driver’s licence with incredulity. _ I wonder if it matters that the only driving I’ve done is military and in the field. _

All he gets from the guy behind the counter is a _ what, like Mr. Rogers? What a beautiful day in the goddamn neighbourhood?, _which Steve just laughs off with a shrug. Fifteen minutes later he walks out with the keys to a beige 2005 Toyota Corolla, which he eventually finds at the back of the lot. 

_ Oh, _ he thinks when he sees it. _ Natasha will hate this. _

He opens up her contact on his phone and calls her. “No,” she says immediately.

“You don’t want a ride?”

“In a 2005 Toyota Corolla? Steve, there is nothing worse than that.”

“It would match your taste in movies.”

“Have we somehow been watching different movies together?”

“Corolla spelt backwards is Alloroc.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Yes,” he replies. “I know.”

The silence on the other end of the line feels like a win, so Steve tries again. “So, do you want a ride with me, or do you want to just stick to the original plan and tail me like a professional while I pretend to know you’re not there?”

She heaves a total hyperbole of a sigh. Steve tries harder. “It’ll be fun. We can listen to swing and complain about American capitalism.”

_ “Each one you buy is a bullet in the barrel of your best guy’s gun,” _she says, lowering her voice in her best impression of Captain America, USO Showgirl Extraordinaire. He can hear the smile in her voice, and he knows she’ll be here in five minutes. 

“Great,” he replies, opening the back door of the car to throw his bag onto the seat. “Pick up some coffees?”

She hangs up on him.

❖

Ten minutes later, Steve’s parked outside of the lot and waiting when his passenger side door opens, and Natasha drops in with two coffees and a bag full of fresh pastries.

“I come bearing too many pastries for an old man who doesn’t deserve them. I’m already losing international respect just from opening this door. If I sit in this seat, no one will fear me anymore,” she says, as she drops into the seat.

Steve grins and pulls out two croissants and a danish, finishing one croissant in three bites. He tries the coffee and hums appreciatively. “Thanks.”

Natasha just eyes him from her seat, then reaches into her pocket for her phone. Steve doesn’t see what she does with it, since the screen is still facing her, but when she slides it back into her pocket she says, “I have to leave the tracker on.”

And Steve hears _ but everything else is shut off. _Wordlessly, he starts the car and pulls onto the road, driving in silence until they reach the freeway. They’ve left the city after rush hour, so the traffic isn’t too bad. 

Eventually, Steve reaches for the radio, turning the dial up to a low hum. Swing music fills the silence, and Natasha sends an incredulous look his way. 

“Really?”

Steve grins. “You thought I was lying?”

She narrows her eyes. “Joking, maybe. You’re an awful liar.” She leans back in her seat, a new gleam in her eye; then, she smiles, all teeth, and kicks her feet up onto the dash. “In that case, I want to tell you about a theory of mine.”

Steve quirks a brow. “About American capitalism?”

She swipes at him, shaking her head. “I’m sitting in an automobile with Captain America, we don’t need to talk about American capitalism.”

“Alright?”

“So,” she says, with a serious expression on her face. “If you ever ask, Fury will tell you he lost his eye in some very important, very violent fight. But based on the scarring that _ is _ visible above his eye, I think it was a cat.”

For the first time since 1945, Steve laughs.

❖

Two hours later, Natasha turns to him. “Why’d you ask?”

She doesn’t specify about _ what, _but Steve knows what she’s asking. “It’s ridiculous that you would have to tail me all the way to DC when I’m just driving there myself. Besides, aren’t we friends?” And there’s a small twist of guilt there, because friends don’t keep secrets, but Steve’s been keeping some for years, and Natasha really has been the only constant thing in his life, even if she is officially his super secret handler. “I’ve read your file. It was part of the Avengers Initiative package that Fury gave me. We’re people plucked out of time. Maybe not for the same reasons, or by the same methods, but we are. You know, shared life experience.”

“I was a soviet spy trained from a young age to kill.”

“Russia is a cold place, ain’t it? So’s a block of ice. There’s some shared life experience.”

“You’re really reaching on that one, Rogers.” 

“Well I guess I should just pull over now and drop you off, if you’re just going to rain on my parade."

Natasha smiles and leans her head against the window, staring at the road ahead. “You’re not what I was expecting, Steve.”

Little bits and pieces of him slipping through the cracks of _ Captain America’s _mask. “I know, Nat.”

❖

“Hey, Pegs,” he says, stepping into the room. He nods to the nurse behind him, asking her to close the door, and she and the two agents — there to guard her room, because Peggy is still _ Agent Carter — _step outside to let them have some privacy.

“Oh, _ Steve,” _she whispers. Her eyes are clear, which Steve has been told is a good sign. “Look at you.”

Steve gives a self-deprecating laugh. “Still got nothing on you, Pegs.”

“Oh, stop it,” she admonishes, and pats the spot next to her on the bed. “Come, sit, Steve.”

Steve makes his way over to her, leans down to kiss her on the cheek, and settles into the chair next to her bed. 

❖

Steve listens with a smile on his face as Peggy talks, tells him about the life she had and her children and her grandchildren and her great-grandchildren and the back of his eyes sting, just a little, but the light in her eyes keeps his own vision from going blurry. A couple of times, she goes misty eyed and blinks back into awareness having lost the past thirty minutes, six months, three decades, and while Steve thought that it would maybe be best to leave, he figured out quickly that even if she’s not one hundred percent clear on her surroundings, it’s calming to have someone else there. 

He leaves after three hours, leaning down to give her another peck on the cheek before promising to be back again tomorrow. 

❖

When he gets back to the hotel, Natasha is in his room with five boxes of pizza and her shoes kicked to the other side of the room. Her hair is pulled back in a short, fluffy pony-tail, and she might as well be in her pajamas. 

“In the spirit of getting you adjusted to the twenty-first century, tonight we will have a movie night,” she gestures over the table, “with a ton of pizza.”

Steve looks at her blankly. “I’ve been ‘adjusting’ to the twenty-first century for nearly six months now, and we’ve already decided your taste in movies is horrendous.”

“I don’t remember that,” she says, completely, one-hundred percent innocent. “But tonight, we’re watching _ Shrek. _And its sequel.”

❖

Steve goes back the next day, just like he promised — not that Peggy remembered, and even if it breaks his heart a little when she smiles like she hasn’t seen him in decades, he still can’t help the small smile he gives her in return.

Most of what they talk about today she told him yesterday, but Steve doesn’t mind. 

She’s talking about SHIELD and some of the people she worked with, back in the 80s, and Steve is only kind of listening, mostly just watching her face and the way her eyes crinkle, thinking _ she must have smiled a lot _when she mentions a name, off-handedly. 

She says _ the _ name, _ his _name. The name that Steve’s been chasing since April 1942.

Everything stops. His heart pounds like a drum and he hears Bucky ask him _ is it permanent?, _because he’s wondering if he’s all of a sudden gone deaf once more — the only sound registering in his mind are those two words repeating themselves in Peggy’s voice. 

“Alexander Pierce?” He asks, from miles away, decades away, can smell dust and mould and old wallpaper and feel Bucky’s hair between his fingers. _ You burn the world, Stevie. _ But it’s too much to hope for, to even _ think — _ it’s been _ seventy fucking years — _

“Yes, he is very close with Nicholas. Not too long ago, Nick saved his daughter from a terrorist attack. I wasn’t aware that you knew him, Steve.” If she notices the shift in his body language, she doesn’t mention it.

“Oh, I don’t think I’ve met him, Pegs — just a really long time ago, someone who came to visit me mentioned his name. Probably just a coincidence.” _ I hope — I want — _

_ Which would be worse? Truth, or coincidence? _

Peggy’s gaze shifts, going from openly pleasant to serious in seconds. She studies Steve with a small furrow in her brow, mouth turned down in the corners. “Before your training?”

Steve is momentarily thrown — he’s taken Peggy’s stream of consciousness in stride, not trying to catch any kind of coherency in his fingers when her memories all flow together like a river; her hair is pure white and decades line her face and the room smells a little too strongly of lavender, but she still refuses to go a day without wearing her red lipstick and even if she doesn’t remember the details she still trusts her gut and can still use her wit to cut anyone to the bone. Of all the moments of clarity her mind would gift to her, this isn’t the one Steve is expecting.

He should have known better. 

He slumps in his seat. “Yeah, Pegs. Way back in 1942.”

Her eyes widen and her gaze darts to the door and back to him, and Steve tenses in his seat. _ Of course Peggy’s room is being monitored. _He doesn’t know if there are any actual audio recording devices, but for her own safety cameras are in the room and in the hall. 

“What a strange coincidence,” she says, but when her hand reaches his she squeezes so tightly that her hand turns even whiter. “It might even be the same person, seven decades later. Just like me.” _ Maybe it didn’t matter that you knew his name back then. Maybe he was just a boy, like you were, and this is where we need to be, where he can stand trial for what he’s done. _

“Yeah,” Steve says, mind reeling. “The world’s a small place, ain’t it?” 

❖

Steve closes the door to Peggy’s room as quietly as he can, and makes it ten steps down the hall before he has to brace himself against the wall. _ How can this be real? How can this be what’s actually — for fuck’s sake, what the fuck is — _

_ Why am I here? _

Alexander Pierce is an old man. An old man who’s lived a full life, torturing Bucky. _ But what if I’m too late, now? _

_ What if it’s too late for us? After all of this time, all of our sacrifice — _

Steve can see it clearly, now. Bucky falls off the train, survives — it’s obvious, in hindsight, that Bucky had received _ something _ like the serum, and then he’s found by enemy soldiers. The Germans? It can’t be the Russians, but maybe — 

Based on what Steve knows about history _ now, _ though. _ Maybe. _It’s too much to even consider.

Alexander Pierce is alive. Alexander Pierce is involved with SHIELD. _ What does it all mean? _

He drops his head into his hands, closing his eyes. _ And meanwhile, I slept. For seventy fucking years, I slept. Bucky. Oh my god, Bucky. _

_ I’m so sorry, sweetheart. _

❖

“You know anything about Alexander Pierce?” he asks Natasha, an hour into their drive back to New York.

“The Secretary of the World Security Council?” She asks, giving him a strange look. “Sure, I guess. He works a lot with Fury, he has a hand in a lot of things for SHIELD, too. STRIKE teams, mostly, and his base is back there in DC. Why are you asking?”

“Pegs talked a bit about him,” he says, eyes on the road. “But I swear I’ve heard his name somewhere before.”

**BEGINNING OF THE END**

❖

Steve doesn’t get a chance to look deeper into who Alexander Pierce is, because whether Steve likes it or not, _ Avengers-fucking-Assemble. _ The next few days go by in a haze of adrenaline and fear and _ everything special about you came out of a bottle. _

Fury finally has an opportunity to throw his Avengers into the ring, and they’re a mess. A _ time-bomb, _according to Dr. Banner, and some part of Steve agrees. None of them are really ready to work as a team, and none of them are really soldiers, and Steve is saying all of the wrong things at all of the wrong times. 

_ Everything special about you came out of a bottle. _

It was something said in the heat of an argument, but it digs deeper than anything else said to him yet. The wounds fester, even now, and he tries to shove the pain and anger down to deal with later, if ever.

Because his own tender feelings are not what’s important right fucking now, because HYDRA. The argument that had them all throwing verbal knives at each other happened before Steve could process what he had found, but — HYDRA weapons, just hanging out in the helicarrier like no one’s damn business and Steve had actually lost track of time just standing there like an idiot. Of course he’s an idiot, because what was their spiel? _ Cut off one head, another grows in its place? _ Well whoop-dee- _ fucking- _doo, there better be a good explanatoin for this. 

But Steve already has an awful feeling about said explanation, pieces slowly but surely coming together in his mind to paint a gruesome picture. 

❖

Aliens fall out of the sky like they’re always supposed to have done, and Steve can feel the way his forearm burns with constant healing, the force of hitting so many foes with his SHIELD powerful enough to bruise. 

It’s pure chaos. More than he ever thought he’d have to see again — buildings crumble and people run screaming from creatures who fly through holes in the sky; Steve doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to wrap his mind around it, even after it’s all done. 

Bruce still hasn’t been seen since the fight on the helicarrier, and Thor hasn’t been in contact. 

Steve has to believe they’ll show up, eventually.

Having someone at his six once more is something Steve didn’t think he’d feel again. He’s a little ticked that he’s only finding out about Clint now, especially since it seems like Natasha really cares about him, but he’ll chew her out about it later, and then introduce himself to Clint properly; maybe he’ll talk to him about his sniping. Steve knows a little bit about that, after all.

❖

Things get moving when Bruce comes rolling in on a bike and then in the next moment turns into the Hulk and punches a fucking space whale in the goddamn nose and Steve just can’t fucking deal with this. 

_ Look, Buck. There’s a fucking space whale, and I’m just gonna whack it with my fucking metal fruit bowl. _

One day Steve is going to say _ fuckity fucking fuck _out loud and his whole fucking cover will be blown.

But finally the Avengers are something of a team, because being rained on by space whale guts can do that to people, and Steve takes charge of the group, giving out orders and making sure that all of their options are covered with their limited numbers.

Even while doing it, though, there’s a voice in the back of his head asking _ why am I the one giving orders? These people don’t know that I’ve messed up not only my first chance, but my second _ and _ third — _

“I need a lift,” Natasha says, bringing him back to the present. She’s turned away from him with eyes on The Stark Monstrosity. 

Steve gives their surroundings a sweep, which is mostly just full of alien corpses and crushed vehicles and kids recording it all on their phones. “I need a nap.”

“Old man,” Natasha says with a smile, turning her gaze to right over his shoulder. He can hear more aliens coming closer, the _ hum _ of their ships getting louder as they approach. “I found my ride.”

“You sure?” He asks, but he’s already squatting, holding his SHIELD flat like a board. 

“Yeah,” she says, and when her smile turns sharp and her eyes flash with determination, Steve feels the same swoop of fondness and rush of adrenaline he used to get with the Howlies. “It’ll be fun.”

And then she pounces, vaulting off of the hood of a car and landing hard on Steve’s SHIELD; he launches her into the air, and he can’t stop the way his mouth curls up at the corners as he watches her fly away on an alien space bike.

❖

Watching Tony fall is an out-of-body experience. First, there was the anger, the desperation, the settling that always leaves an awful twist of guilt in your gut when you know that sacrifice is the only way to win; then, there’s the rush of relief when Tony slips through the portal at the last second; third, there is ice and wind and bending metal and grief because Tony is _ falling. _

“He’s not slowing down,” Thor says, spinning Mjolnir to take off — Steve is completely useless, frozen in place, and he doesn’t notice Hulk flying across the sky to catch him before he hits the ground right in front of them. 

_ Oh my god, oh my god — _Steve rips the mask off of the Iron Man suit and tries to fit his fingers inside the helmet to find a pulse. “Jarvis? Jarvis are you there? Can you read anything?” But Jarvis is unresponsive, Tony is unresponsive, and — 

A roar right behind Steve’s head knocks him onto his ass. Tony gasps, limbs flailing and eyes wide. The Hulk sits back, satisfied, while Steve and Thor just stare at him in shock. “Well.”

“Oh my fucking god. Did — did we win? It sure doesn’t feel like it. Am I dead? I hope I’m dead. I remember running out of oxygen, and the only way to fix that is if one of you kissed me. I would honestly rather all of us die than have any of you kiss me.” Tony struggles to get up, fails, lets himself go limp again. He turns his head and squints at the sign of a restaurant, and when Steve looks as well, he notices that — _ holy fuck that restaurant is open — _“Have any of you guys had shawarma? I’ve never had shawarma. We should have some. Team bonding.”

“... Sustenance after a battle is good,” Thor allows. “I have never tried this shawarma.”

❖

“You ok?” Natasha asks, once everything is over and done. Thor and Loki have headed back to Asgard, Tony’s dragged Buce to some lab he built just for him, and Clint is waiting for Natasha across the street, sitting in the driver’s seat of a black sports car.

Steve gives her a small smile. “‘M fine, Nat. You heading out?”

The skin around her eyes tightens, and her mouth makes the slightest downward curl. “You were upset, more than I was expecting. At the end.” _ When Tony was falling, _ he knows she means. It’s not a criticism of his character, or a comment on his lack of empathy — he is a soldier, and they both know what that sometimes means. But it became personal, and she doesn’t know why. _ I could tell her that, at least. Couldn’t I? _

He looks down, kicks his feet. Sighs. “It —”_’s harder to say it out loud than I thought. _He gives her a small, apologetic smile. “Bucky — fell. At then end.”

The only information about how Bucky died was that there was no information at all. _ Sergeant Barnes was the only Commando to give his life in the service of the army. _

She frowns. “How long before you crashed?”

He swallows. “Six days.”

She takes his hand and gives it a squeeze, saying nothing because nothing really _ can _ be said. 

“That’s not in the history books.”

“Yeah, I know.” Steve knows it comes out bitter, and Natasha raises her eyebrows.

“Why don’t you tell anyone?”

_ Hope? _ But he can’t really say that without having any questions being asked, so he says the next best thing. “It’s barely been six months. And almost 68 years.”

She sighs, dipping her head in acknowledgement. She reaches into the bag she’s got slung over her shoulder and pulls out a manila envelope, blank on both sides. “Before the alien shit hit the fan, you asked me what I know about Alexander Pierce. Here’s what I have,” she says as she hands over the file.

Now it’s Steve’s turn to raise his brows. “I thought you said I could just look him up on The Google.”

Steve knows very well that it’s just _ google. _ But _ The Google _makes Natasha’s face go blank so quickly that he knows she’s trying not to laugh.

“Where’s the fun in that?” She leans in to give him a kiss on the cheek. “Take care of yourself, Rogers. Keep in touch. Wash your fucking dishes.”

**BURN**

❖

_ Pierce, Alexander Goodwin. _

_ Date of Birth: August 18, 1936. _

Most of the file is classified. A lot of it is redacted, which shouldn’t surprise Steve. _ Undersecretary, huh? _ And Head of SHIELD. Secretary of the World Security Council. Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. _ What would he have to do with Bucky? _

It makes sense that the Alexander Pierce that Bucky told him about wouldn’t just be some _ nobody — _especially with the tech and the armour and his arm. 

Tech that Steve recognizes now, since he’s seen a lot of it lying around Tony’s labs. 

There are a few random notes that catch Steve’s interest, something about the release of a Werner Reinhardt and comments about how he came off a little too bloodthirsty at times. 

But there’s nothing there to suggest something like _ HYDRA. _

_ Nat must think I’m crazy, _he thinks, leaning back on the couch with a sigh. He picks up his phone and opens a new text chat. 

_ [Jarvis?] _

_ [Yes, Captain?] _

_ [Is there anything you can find on Pierce in the SHIELD database?] _

Three little dots appear at the bottom of the screen, jumping up and down as Jarvis completes his scan. While Steve waits, he continues to flip through files from Natasha, and he comes across a photo, looking to be around twenty years old. It’s of Pierce and a man in a Russian military uniform, shaking hands. 

Knowing about Natasha’s ties to the KGB, Steve isn’t surprised that Nat would throw that in just as something for herself — but something about the photo makes him stop. 

_Zimniy soldat_. Bucky was speaking russian. It’s possible that — he flips the photo over, and sure enough, on the back of the photo, are the words _ exchange of goodwill between Russia and America, 1999. _

It’s vague, and weird, and could be absolutely nothing, but it wouldn’t hurt to look into it. His phone vibrates.

_ [Unfortunately Captain anything else directly related to Secretary Pierce is not available in the SHIELD database.] _

_ [Thank you, Jarvis. Can you scan facial recognition of this person for me?] _ He takes a photo of the russian officer’s face and uploads it to their chat. _ [I think there could be a connection here.] _

_ [Certainly, Captain. One moment. _

_ [The man is Vasily Karpov, an officer in the Russian Military. Most of his files are redacted. His last known address is in Siberia, dated 1999.] _

_ [Date of death?] _

_ [None listed, Captain.] _

Huh. When there is a little bit of information, then you can believe that the soldier’s career wasn’t too eventful. But when there is no information at all, then there is some digging that needs to be done. _ [Any possibility that he’s still around?] _

_ [I can scan surveillance cameras for possible matches. I will have results in an hour.] _

_ [Thank you, Jarvis.] _

_ [You are welcome, Captain. I am happy to be of assistance. I will delete this conversation in thirty seconds.] _

❖

He’s on his way to Cleveland by the end of the week. 

It took a couple of days to make sure that no one would be on his case for leaving, that people who asked would just know that he’d like a break from the city for a few days, you know, _ to get adjusted — aliens, amiright, _and he promised Nat that he’d bring her back a souvenir. They sent him off with a smile and only two bug in his car, which he leaves in Pittsburgh in a hotel parking lot, books a room for three nights, dumps his belongings and then promptly goes to find a rental. He’s back on the road within two hours, and he’s in Cleveland by 9PM.

It’s his first time in the city, but he bypasses downtown and keeps going to the east side; the longer he drives the more rundown the neighbourhoods get, and he finds a parking spot up the street from 176 Millwood. 

The street is quiet, with some houses boarded up and others with curtains closed. No one will notice Steve this time of night. He watches Karpov’s house — Jarvis says he’s living under the name Nikolai Ivanov — through the rearview mirror, and by 11:30 the lights are out. Steve waits a few more minutes before turning the ignition in his car and driving around the block, finds a spot to park the rental and walks back to Millwood. He considers some of the boarded up houses before sliding between two abandoned ones side-by-side; with a noise buffer on either side and no light to reveal him to anyone on the street, Steve rips the boards off of the side window with ease, and hops into the home. 

Micec scatter when he lands, and something falling over in the next room suggests there’s something larger than a mouse also living here, but Steve doesn’t really care; he makes his way to the front room and finds a spot where he can sit back and watch Karpov’s house without having to worry about being seen. There’s a gap between the boards in the front window. 

All Steve needs to do is wait.

Karpov doesn’t turn any lights on, but he leaves his house well before dawn; early enough that no one will even know he’s gone by the time the rest of the street wakes up. Steve watches him leave, watches him pull his hood over his head and shove his hands in his pockets. He’s hunched over, limping slightly — it’s been over a decade since the photo with Pierce was taken, and it shows. 

He counts to sixty once he’s rounded the corner, and Steve climbs out the side window of the house. He pulls his own hood up, just in case, and walks across the street to the narrow little path that’s shoved between two houses a few up from Karpov’s: it opens up to an alley between the blocks, and all of the houses’ yards have gates opening up to it. Steve figures Karpov would have thought it a quick escape, but for Steve it’s just pure luck. He still doesn’t want to trigger any kind of alarm set up on the gate, so he jumps the fence around Karpov’s yard and walks right up to the back of the house. He knocks the small window to the house’s basement open, and slips through. 

He coughs at the cloud of dust his feet kick up from landing on a pile of old boxes, and he looks around: the basement is dark and musty, but there’s a tub and counter along one wall and some books piled on an old wooden desk, half-melted candles and matches left on a plate in the corner. He spends a couple of minutes searching the boxes spread out on the floor, not really expecting to find anything of import, and then runs his fingers along the walls, knocking every now and then, but stands back with his hands on his hips when he finds nothing. _ That’s not right. _He turns around, and yeah, there’s a big bulky cabinet that is definitely not randomly placed against the middle of the wall. He walks over and leans on the side, pushing it gently across the floor so he doesn’t tip it; sure enough, when he checks, there’s a hollow space right behind where the cabinet stood. 

_ Gotcha. _

Steve swings his arm back and punches through the wall, grabbing the edge of the drywall as he pulls his hand away with enough force to rip a hole large enough to fit both his arms through. 

When he reaches inside he grabs hold of a small box. It’s made of thin metal, with no symbols or writing on the sides. Steve drops it onto the table with a loud _ clang _ and tips it over, dumping all of its content onto the table. He sifs through the files and photos, and picks up a red book with a star on the cover. Flipping through it, he sees lists and diagrams and notes made in cyrillic — at the end of every note, it is signed off with a _ Hail Hydra. _

_ Jesus Fucking Shit Christ, yeah, that fucking hurts. _

He turns the page and he finds a set of three small photographs, in the style of mugshots; front, left, right. 

_ Bucky. _

At the top of each photo is the date _ (12/03/91) _and the words Зимний солдат. 

_ “... I’m the Asset. _ _ Zimniy soldat__. _ _ ” _

_ The Asset. The Winter Soldier. _ Things that are meant to take away _ Bucky. _ Steve takes a deep breath and closes the book, because he needs to _ get a fucking grip. _ He tidies everything up, puts all of the files back in the box and closes the lid; he puts the box on the floor by the window, and goes to slide the cabinet back in front of the hole in the wall, and considers his options. 

He could stick around and wait. He _ wants _to wait. He could just sit right there in the chair at the desk and wait for Karpov to come home and Steve can look him in the eye and tell him that today is the day he’s going to die. He’ll know that this is what he gets for hurting Bucky, even decades later.

But Steve knows that for that reason, he shouldn’t. He needs to leave; there is a very slim chance that Karpov knows anything more about Bucky or the Winter Soldier than what the files and the red book in the box can give him, and Steve needs to make sure that nothing he does today can be traced back to him. _ For Bucky. _

So Steve heads upstairs, careful to check that he’s not leaving footsteps in the dust — _ because the place is a fucking pigsty — _and he checks all of the vents in the house, closing more than half of them — it’s summer, so no one is going to think it’s strange to keep the heat vents closed. He heads back downstairs and walks right up to the furnace in the back, and opens the draft hood. 

He can’t just turn it on max, because, again, it’s summer, but from the looks of it, the pipes are pretty old and if Steve can make it look like they just _ cracked, _ then — he looks around the room, and spies a toolbox under the sink. _ Bingo. _

He takes a flat-head screwdriver and a hammer out of the box and instead of using the pipes inside of the furnace, he goes for the exposed ones on the side; he lines up the screwdriver and hammer over the pipe and swings, the tip sinks right into the metal to the blade. Steve pulls it out and puts the tools down before wrapping his hands around the pipe and _ twists — _the metal is old enough that he can easily cause a hairline fracture, and he can feel the air rushing out when he hovers his hand over the pipe. 

_ Alright. Time for one last fuck-you. _

He goes over to the desk and strikes a match, lighting the candle. _ You burn the world, Stevie. __But no one can ever know._

He collects the box of HYDRA files and heaves himself up through the window once more; he jimmies it shut behind him, making sure that there is no air seeping through, and makes the walk back his car still in the cover of darkness; the sun still isn’t more than a speck on the horizon. 

Steve drives his car back around to Millwood and waits for Karpov to return; he does barely fifteen minutes later, a plastic bag hanging off of his arm. He unlocks his front door and steps inside. 

Stevee starts the car and begins his drive back to Pittsburgh. 

❖

_ “.... and for local news, a fire was reported on the east side of town this morning, resulting in the death of the home’s single resident. The local fire department has announced that the cause was a gas leak, and the police will not be getting involved.” _

**INTERLUDE: PROJECT ECLIPSE**

❖

After Karpov, Steve hits an impasse; August is come and nearly gone, and as the days begin to shorten he can feel the futility of his mission closing in on him. _ How can there be so little to go on? _

_ The Winter Soldier _ is a ghost. Over two dozen kills over the past 50 years, most people believe that it’s multiple people working under one codename; Steve knows that it’s not true, even though he understands how others would jump to that conclusion. 

The files he got from Karpov don’t have a lot about Bucky, but he knew that, didn’t he? Karpov hadn’t been involved in the Winter Soldier program in years, so it makes sense that the files would only provide information from decades earlier. Only the red book proved to be truly useful, in the way that it lists fucking _ trigger words _ that take away Bucky’s will like stones from a dam. The side-effects of a _ single _ one of those words are enough to make Steve need to throw up. 

_ I’m so sorry, Buck, Sweetheart. Sweetheart. _

He’s just pulling up to his apartment on his bike after a day of numbing his mind via endless, boring highway, when he notices that the light in his apartment is on; he stares at his window for a few seconds, but he just shrugs and climbs off the bike. It’s most likely Natasha, since she’s the only one who actually visits him since the Chitauri attack.

When Steve opens the door, sure enough Natasha is leaning against his counter, helping herself to a cup of coffee. “I finished your milk.”

“The day I’m surprised that you ignore the common conventions of hospitality and personal space is the day you should shoot me dead.” He tells her, kicking off his boots and leaving them in a pile in the doorway.

She smiles over her mug. “But I did bring some extra with me, like I do every time. Do you ever go grocery shopping?”

Steve huffs a laugh and goes to get his own mug. “No, since I know you’ll just bring them with you.”

There’s no quip in reply, and when Steve turns to see what’s up, Natasha is just watching him, a small frown maring her brow. “What is it?”

“I bring them because I care, you know that, right? Because you’re real shit at taking care of yourself sometimes, Steve. And you don’t wash your fucking dishes.”

And she’s not wrong, he knows. But of everyone, Natasha has been the one who seems to understand the most what he’s lost, even if she doesn’t know the whole picture (no one will, not as long as that’s what’s needed to keep _ him _ safe), and she’s made the biggest effort to keep in contact with him while they’re not on duty. 

But, “It’s hard to keep up, sometimes. Everything moves so fast, here.” He stares down at his hands, large and strong and still just as useless as they had been in 1942. “‘Welcome to the future’, indeed,” he laughs.

She puts her mug on the counter and steps closer, laying a hand on his arm. “Steve, I _ know _ that you’re up to something. I know that you’re still doing something with those files I gave you back in April, and you’re lucky that I’m the only one that’s noticed. But you need to be _ careful. _ I can _ help, _ Steve.” 

He looks away from her, shaking his head. “Not yet, Natasha. I — can’t tell you. Not yet.”

She sighs, leaning back against the counter. They let the silence fill the space for a few minutes before she says, “Move to DC.”

Steve looks over, surprised. “What?”

“Come to DC. Take over a STRIKE team, work with me. There isn’t anything for you here except ghosts, Steve. And your girlfriend is in DC.”

Steve huffs a laugh. “Don’t have a girlfriend, Nat.”

“Yeah,” she replies. “I’ve noticed, you lonely fucker. You can’t just sit and wallow in here. Move south, go on some field trips with me, punch some assholes in the face, giving the occasional kneecapping. It’ll be fun.”

Steve smiles at her, indulgent. “How does anyone ever say no to you?”

“Well, they _can_ say no. It’s just generally not a good idea.”

❖

“Secretary Pierce?”

Alexander Pierce looks up from his desk at the scientist who’s come knocking. “Yes?”

“Project Eclipse is ready for the Asset.”


	2. Part Two

**ON YOUR LEFT**

❖

Washington is nice, he supposes. It’s much quieter than New York, and hasn’t really changed all that much since he was here for his show with the USO. 

Although the quiet might just be because it’s five in the morning. He’s been running for two hours already. 

_ There’s been no change, no more information. _ Since the incident with Karpov, Steve hasn’t been able to find anything on where Bucky could be now, or even _ if _ he’s in the States. Three weeks later, and it still burns like nothing he’s ever known to realize that HYDRA have had him, all of that time.

_ Is it possible they still have him? Could they be here, in the States, right under our noses — _

It’s a possibility he doesn’t really want to think about, but the harder he runs the more he knows, in his gut, that he’ll have to look into it. There has been nothing else that’s even _ hinted _ at an organization insidious enough to have use for the Winter Soldier.

Steve pushes himself harder. He still hasn’t begun to sweat.

The sun begins to rise over the Potomac, and he turns towards the Lincoln Memorial. 

_ But if Karpov had transferred the Soldier to another HYDRA branch, wouldn’t he have given them the book? _ The list of trigger words that would turn the Soldier into a mindless servant, all guns drawn, seems like something a handler should know. _ Ready to comply, _it said he would respond with. It makes Steve’s feel like throwing up. 

He doesn’t notice the runner in front of him until almost too late; “On your left,” he says, swerving at the last second. He turns the corner on the Reflection Pool.

_ But I wouldn’t be surprised if American HYDRA doesn’t really get along with Russian HYDRA. It’s not like their legitimate organisations do, so why should the secret ones do any better? _ He blinks back into awareness when he realizes he’s coming back up behind the runner again. “On your left,” he repeats, and from his peripheral he sees the man wave him off, panting. _ Yeah, yeah, whatever, man. _

Steve laps him twice more; hee sees the moment the jogger hears him again. He ducks his head and pumps his legs harder, yelling “Don’t say it! Don’t you fucking say it, man!” 

Steve laughs soundlessly and just holds back bumping him in the shoulder when he replies, “On your left.”

“Come _ on!” _

_ I guess I can take one more lap without thinking about fucking HYDRA. _

❖

“Need a medic?”

The jogger laughs, bent over with his hands on his knees. “I need a new set of lungs. Dude, you just ran like 13 miles in 30 minutes.”

Steve stands back, amused. “Huh. Late start, I guess.”

He gets an incredulous glare for that. “Oh, _ really? _ You should be ashamed of yourself. You should take another lap.” He lowers his head again, still trying to catch his breath. When he looks back up at Steve, there’s a smirk on his face. “Did you just take it? I assume you just took it.”

Steve laughs, and it comes easier than he was expecting. He gestures to the emblem on the other man’s sweater. “What unit you with?”

He smiles, but it’s small. “58, Pararescue. But now I'm working down at the VA. Sam Wilson.”

Steve gives Sam a hand up, keeping ahold once they’re standing. “Steve Rogers.”

“I kind of put that together. Must have freaked you out coming home after the whole defrosting thing.”

_Not quite home yet, though I’m working on it. _He steps back, ready to make his way back to his new SHIELD box. “It takes some getting used to. It's good to meet you, Sam.”

“It's your bed, right?”

“What's that?” Steve turns around as he continues walking. 

Sam, for his part, looks a little sheepish. “Your bed, it's too soft. When I was over there I'd sleep on the ground and use rock for pillows, like a caveman. Now I'm home, lying in my bed, and it's like…”

_ Ah. Well, he gets it. _ Steve stops, hands on his hips. “Lying on a marshmallow. Feel like I'm gonna sink right to the floor.”

Sam smiles and nods his head.

“How long?”

“Two tours. You must miss the good old days, huh?”

It’s still funny to Steve that _ the good old days _ are what people call the Great Depression. That _ the good old days _were full of racism and sexism and homophobia and a world war. “Well, things aren't so bad. Food's a lot better — we used to boil everything. No polio is good. Internet, so helpful. I've been reading that a lot trying to catch up.”

Sam watches him for a minute, considering, and then seemingly makes up his mind about something. “You got a list?”

Steve pulls out his little notebook, making a ‘_ go for it’ _expression at Sam. “Marvin Gaye, 1972, "Trouble Man" soundtrack,” Sam tells him. “Everything you've missed jammed into one album.”

“I'll look into it,” he replies, honest about it for once. His phone vibrates, and smiles an apology to Sam before pulling it out of his pocket. _ Mission alert. Extraction imminent. Meet you at the curb :) _

Natasha had been away on a mission for the past ten days, and Steve doesn’t even get a hello. He shakes his head, looking back up at Sam. “Duty calls. Thanks again for the walk.”

Sam raises his eyebrows. “Oh, that's how it is?”

Steve grins. “Oh, that's how it is.”

Sam laughs, shaking his head at Steve. “Okay. Alright, cool. In return for using me as a way to level just how awesome and fast you are, stop by the VA any time to make me look good for the girl at the front desk.”

“I'll keep it in mind.”

“I wasn’t asking! Not if you’re just gonna lap me seven times in four minutes.”

Steve is still laughing when Natasha pulls up at the curb, leaning into the passenger side and calling out the window. “Hey, fellas. Either one of you know where the Smithsonian is? I'm here to pick up a fossil.”

Steve smiles down at her, and she snaps her gum at him. “You’re hilarious,” he deadpans.

“Are you sure you haven’t seen it? It’s built like a caveman and lives like one, too; it doesn’t ever wash its fucking dishes.” 

Steve rolls his eyes, opening the door and climbing in. “It was nice meeting you, Sam.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he says, squatting down to sweep his gaze appreciatively over the car, finishing up with a slow smirk Natasha’s way. “How you doin’?”

Natasha’s smile widens. “Hey.”

Steve makes a gagging noise. Natasha punches him in the arm. “Fossils are seen, not heard.”

❖

“So, what are your plans for the weekend?”

Steve looks up from where he’s cleaning his gun, incredulous. “Really?”

“What?” Natasha asks, flipping her hair over her shoulder. It hangs past her shoulders now, and it’s bone straight. Steve thinks it suits her. “I can’t ask a friend about his plans?”

“You’re never _ just _ asking about my plans.”

“Well, no, of course not.” She says, looking at him like he’s being an idiot. “Why would I do that? Such a waste of time. Better to get all of the information you need as quickly as you can.”

Steve smiles and turns back to his weapons. “Well, in that case: no, I don’t have anything planned out of the ordinary — which you know — plus, all of the guys from my barbershop quartet are dead, jeez. And no, I do not want to go on a blind date, and no, not even with whoever it is you’re thinking of.”

Natasha purses her lips. “Not even Kate?”

“Kate?”

She raises her brows, unimpressed. “Your neighbour.”

“Ah.” His neighbour who is a SHIELD agent sent to keep eyes on him. He looks around to see if any of the STRIKE guys are listening and relaxes when he sees they’re all busy. “You mean Sharon,” he replies, voice low. “Yeah, not her.”

“Ah.” 

“Yeah,” he says, “and even if I _ were _ interested, I wouldn’t be interested in Peg’s niece, Nat.”

She scrunches her nose at that, dipping her head in acknowledgement. “Yeah, I guess not.”

They both turn away to finish getting ready for the mission, the silence surprisingly comfortable. When they’re both completely strapped and zipped and clipped into their uniforms, Natasha turns an assessing gaze on Steve. “How long have you known?”

Steve just gives her a _ look. _

She blinks, actually surprised. “You’ve known the whole time. Since you woke up. There’s no way we would have missed you finding out, otherwise.”

“I was trained by the person who founded the organization you work for, Natasha. Of course I knew there were eyes and ears on me from the moment I woke up.” _ Not to mention that the way they tried to introduce me to the twenty first century was a complete mess and not manipulative at all. _“And I’d rather they think I’m some boring, straightlaced centenarian with no life outside his books and his walks than actually let them know anything personal about me. It’s not exactly an environment that allows for comfortable interactions with people.”

She studies him, a thoughtful expression on her face. “You must feel like you’re in a box.”

“First an ice one, then The Bum-Fucking Nowhere one, then the temporary one, then the hotel apartment one, now the one next to Sharon Carter.”

“You want out.” The way she says it, it’s not a question. 

“Not yet. And nothing permanent, Natasha, stop frowning like that, you’ll get a wrinkle. What kind of international superspy would you be then?” He sighs. “But I’ve got things to do, first.”

Now she narrows her eyes at him. “Things that involve your not so secret dive into old KGB files?”

“You’ll definitely know when it happens,” he tells her, but that does nothing to appease her. Steve leans in to bump their shoulders together, even if it’s more Natasha’s shoulder knocking into his elbow. “Hey. If it gets bad, I’ll tell you. I promised.”

They hear the pilot give the orders to get ready for the jump, and the STRIKE team gets ready behind them. The door in the quinjet releases and begins to open. 

Natasha turns away with a sigh. “You apparently woke up with a mission. That’s already bad enough.”

_ Well, ain’t that the fucking truth. _But there’s nothing else Steve can say about it, so he’s grateful for the opportunity to jump out of the jet to avoid giving her an answer.

**GRIEF**

❖

“It was a setup,” Steve says as he walks into Fury’s office. “You just can’t stop yourself from lying, can you, Fury?”

Fury doesn’t quite sigh. “I didn’t lie. Agent Romanoff had a different mission than yours.”

“Which you didn’t feel obligated to share.” _ There are too many secrets here, too much information that I don’t know how to access. _

“I’m not obliged to do anything.” 

“Those hostages could’ve died, Nick!” Steve says, slamming his fists down onto Fury’s desk. “How am I supposed to lead a mission when everyone’s got different, _ secret _ assignments? For fucks’ sake, _ trust _ is what makes it an army, not just a bunch of soldiers running around with guns.”

Even as he says it, Steve knows that he’s being a hypocrite. But the secrets he’s keeping are personal ones, ones that aren’t endangering multiple lives; secrets that are being kept to _ protect _ people. 

There’s that look on Fury’s face, the one that Steve sees every now and then from people who get something they’re not expecting from him. _ Yeah, I was in a war. Yeah, I know how to run missions. Yeah, fuck is my favourite fucking word. _“I can’t plan for every possible situation if everyone’s got their own agendas, Nick.”

Fury leans back in his chair, the lines of his face softening ever so slightly. “The last time I trusted someone, I lost my fucking eye. Look, I didn’t want you doing anything you weren’t comfortable with. Agent Romanoff is comfortable with everything.”

_ And I’m most comfortable knowing that I have contingencies in place in order to keep everyone on my team safe, but. _“Why don’t you try asking, next time?”

Fury shakes his head. “It’s called compartmentalization. Nobody spills secrets because nobody knows them all.”

“Right, except for you.”

Nick sighs and ducks his head. Steve’s not fooled into thinking he’s reflecting, but he can tell that he’s considering something. Eventually, he gets up and gestures for Steve to follow him. They step out of his office and into his private elevator, and when he asks to be brought down to Insight bay he doesn’t take his eyes off of Steve’s face. “You’re wrong about me, Captain. I do share. I’m nice like that.”

Steve doesn’t sigh. Barely.

** _“_ ** _ Captain Rogers does not have clearance for Project Insight.” _

“Director override, Fury, Nicholas J.”

_ “Confirmed.” _

The ride down is silent, and Steve folds his hands in front of him and stares at the door. He can’t imagine what could possibly be going on that Nick would think could convince Steve that any secrets he’s been keeping are necessary enough to let him have agents with their own missions, but at this point, nothing should surprise him. 

When the door opens to let them into insight bay, it takes him a minute to step out of the elevator. 

“What are those?”

“They’re a little bit bigger than what you’re used to, I suppose,” he says, gesturing widely to three helicarriers, armed to the max. “This is Project Insight. Three next generation helicarriers synced to a network of targeting satellites.”

“Launched from the Lemurian Star.” There’s a buzzing in Steve’s mind; all noise becomes a hum in the background, and Nick is talking more about the project when Steve interrupts, “Stark?”

_ Please don’t be Stark, please don’t be Tony — _

“Well, he had a few suggestions once he got an up close look at our old turbines.” Steve’s heart clenches. _ Is he a part of this? Does he know the havoc these will wreak? _ “These new long range precision guns can eliminate a thousand hostiles a minute. The satellites can read a terrorists’ DNA before he steps outside his spider hole. We’re gonna neutralize a lot of threats before they even happen.

“I thought the punishment usually came after the crime.”

**“**We can't afford to wait that long.”

That makes Steve pause, blood going cold. “Who's _ ‘we’?” _

Fury starts walking, talking over his shoulder at Steve. “Myself, members of the World Security Council, and Alexander Pierce. We’re convinced that we need a quantum surge in threat analysis. Now we’re way ahead of the curve.”

His heart stops, lungs freeze in his chest. _ Alexander Pierce, Alexander Pierce. _ He exhales in a silent gasp, heart kicking to a jumpstart. Steve knows that something is wrong, that there is something about this project that is connected to Bucky, to the Winter Soldier. _ This is it. This is what is going to bring us both home, Buck. _

Pieces that Steve’s been trying to keep in the back of his mind come drifting to the surface. _ You have to consider every option, Rogers. _

He looks back at Fury, breathing hard through his nose. “You’re holding a gun on everyone on Earth and calling it protection.”

“You know, I read those SSR files. Greatest generation? You guys did some nasty stuff.”

Anger rushes through him, quick and consuming. _ So we’re going with the ‘you did it, too’, argument. Doesn’t mean that it’s fucking right for any of us to do it now. _“Yeah, we compromised. Sometimes in ways that made us not sleep so well. But we did it so the people could be free. This isn't freedom, this is fear.”

Fury steps back from Steve, towards the helicarriers. “SHIELD takes the world as it is, not as we'd like it to be. It's getting damn near past time for you to get with that program, Cap.”

“Don't hold your breath.”

❖

Steve leaves SHIELD headquarters without looking back. 

His thoughts are reeling, shuffling between the tesseract, the HYDRA weapons, Pierce and Insight — all of these things are related, and Project Insight must be a piece of the puzzle, somehow.

When Steve gets to his apartment, he immediately takes out his phone and texts _ lockdown, please. 3255703100704. _

_ Of course, Captain. _

Given Tony’s part in building the helicarriers, Steve had wondered if it was safe to continue talking to Jarvis, but he knows that after the Chitauri attack Tony had given everyone permission to use Jarvis for whatever they needed, promising that anything they asked would be completed private; Steve can, reluctantly, picture Tony being involved with Hydra, but he’s sure that Tony would have been up in his business months ago if he knew some of the things Steve was looking at. 

_ And anyways, if it turns out I’m working against Jarvis, we’re all just about fucked either way. _

Steve watches as both texts disappear from his history. He waits a couple of minutes before Jarvis speaks to him again, this time through the speakers._ “Your apartment is now secure, Captain. All recording devices are being fed separate audio feeds.” _

Steve sighs. “Thank you, Jarvis.”

_ “Is there something else that you need assistance with, Captain?” _

“Is there any way you can access the files on Project Insight, Jarvis?”

A few minutes of silence, and then _ “I’m sorry, Captain, but those files will take me at least two days to access. They are locked to all but those with the highest security clearance.” _

Steve frowns. “But Fury said that Tony worked on the helicarriers. Shouldn’t he have access as well?”

_ “If Sir worked on this project, he was not aware of it. I can find nothing about it in any of our databases. However,” _ Jarvis pauses for a moment, “ _ Sir was asked to look at improving the engines on SHIELD’s helicarriers last month.” _

_ And of course Tony wouldn’t need a reason to work on something like that, he probably figured it was just regular upgrades with some added Stark flair. _Steve drops onto the couch, leaning his head back to stare at the ceiling. 

“There are too many pieces. There’s Karpov, and whatever was going on in Russia. There is project insight, and Alexander Pierce. The tesseract. The HYDRA weapons. How —”

_ “I would not suggest such a thing if it were at all impossible, Captain, but it could be possible that HYDRA is still active.” _

It’s what Steve has been trying his best not to say aloud. Because then it’s real, because then, if it’s true, then Steve died for nothing and Bucky was alone all of that time for nothing and it’s not _ fucking fair _that Steve and Bucky have been up against the same enemy for the better part of a century. 

“Yeah, you’re probably right, Jarvis.”

But what does that mean for Bucky? And Steve can’t just open up google and type _ is HYDRA still active? _

How is Alexander Pierce connected to it all? There should be _ something _there that Steve can grab onto. The photo of him and Karpov was what allowed him to finally make the connection to the Winter Soldier, but that was just a chance, just random luck by finding that book in Karpov’s basement. 

Finding Phase Two on the helicarrier had been like a blow to the chest. _ HYDRA weapons. _ Being redesigned and built and used by the people who claimed to protect the earth. _ HYDRA weapons. _Steve can still remember the way the forests were silhouetted in that alien blue light, the way anything touched by it would just crumble to dust. 

Tony and Dr. Banner had been suspicious of _ something, _and yeah, remaking World War Two nazi weapons isn’t really a great idea in the first place, but who funded that project? Who was it that gave it the OK? 

Project Insight practically screams _ ‘perfect order’. _ It’s dystopian, under a utopian mask; Steve knows that utopias can’t ever actually exist. It’s in the name: _ no place. _It sounds like HYDRA. It sounds like something they’d want to do. It sounds like their mission. 

But that means that SHIELD is most likely compromised, and Steve has no idea how far up it goes.

“I shouldn’t rush into this.”

_ “I would not suggest it, Captain.” _

Steve sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I — can’t tell Natasha. Not yet.”

_ “... are you sure about that, Captain?” _

“Not until I know how far it goes. I — what if I’m working with HYDRA? How many of them are around us all day? I can’t trust anyone, not if they could know where Bucky is right now.”

And the thought makes his blood boil, that he could be walking shoulder to shoulder with someone who has interacted with the Winter Soldier. Maybe even with one of Bucky’s handlers. And they don’t even twitch at being in Steve’s presence.

“I’ll tell her soon, Jarvis. But not yet. I have to have more information before I just pull the rug out from under her feet.” He frowns at his ceiling. “She’s doing everything she can to get rid of the red in her ledger. What if I’m wrong? I can’t tell her yet.”

They sit in silence for a few more minutes before Steve asks how much longer he has until the bugs come back online. 

_ “You have forty-three minutes, Captain.” _

“I should probably still go visit Peggy.”

_ “Sticking to your routine would be most wise at this point, Captain.” _

And finally, the downside of having a routine. At this point, if Steve _ doesn’t _ stick to his weekly visits with Peggy — not that he would ever want to skip — it would gain more attention than not. “Alright, cut the time down to five minutes. What have I been doing the past forty-five minutes, Jarvis?”

_ “You have been watching a rerun of Antiques Roadshow, Captain.” _

That puts a smile on his face, at least. “Alright, thank you. If you can, I would appreciate it if you could try and gather any information about Project Insight you can.”

_ “It is my pleasure to help you, Captain. You have two minutes and twenty-four seconds before the recording in your apartment goes live.” _

“Alright. I’ll check back in later, Jarvis.”

_ “Enjoy your visit with Miss Carter, Captain. I will contact you should I find any new information.” _

❖

When Steve gets back to his apartment after his visit with Peggy, Sharon — _ Kate, her name right now is Kate — _is stepping out of her apartment, laundry basket in hand, talking into her cellphone. She smiles at him once she hangs up, saying “Sorry — my aunt, she’s a total insomniac.” 

Steve shakes his head, hands waving in a _ don’t worry about it _ kind of gesture, and as Sharon reaches the top of the stairs, she turns to him and tells him that he must have left his stereo on. 

Steve had heard the music from the lobby of the apartment building, but he didn’t want to bring any more attention to it, just in case. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” and she heads downstairs to the laundry room. To use the communal washer for her bacterial ward scrubs. He sighs, shaking his head. _ Even in the 30s Ma knew to keep her hospital things completely separate. _Steve understands why SHIELD have someone spying on him, but couldn’t she at least be a little better at hiding it?

He pushes the door open — it was unlocked and not closed properly — and leans down to grab the shield leaning against the wall further down the hall. That’s a point for the person not being completely hostile, if they just left Steve’s shield lying in the open, and Steve slides it onto his arm as he turns the corner to look in the living room to see — 

Nick Fury, bleeding on his favourite armchair. _ God fucking dammit. _

“I don’t remember giving you a key,” he says, not lowering the shield.

“You really think I’d need one?” he shifts in the seat and groans a little. “My wife kicked me out.”

_ And ran you over with her car, it looks like. _“Didn’t know you were married.”

“There are a lot of things you don’t know about me.” He turns his phone screen to Steve, showing the words _ EARS EVERYWHERE. _

“Yeah, and that’s the problem here, isn’t it. Who else knows about your wife?”

_ SHIELD COMPROMISED. _ “Just my friends,” he replies, tired. _ YOU AND ME. _

_ Here we fucking go. _ The very same day the Nick shows Steve Project Insight this happens. Steve has to be right. This _ has _ to be it. “Is that what we are now?”

“You’re so fucking dramati —” Steve hears the _ pop pop pop _ of a silencer before he can react, and bullets come through the wall, knocking Fury to the ground. _ Shit, shit, shit fuck. _Steve is on the ground next to him, shield thrown to the side, and Nick is gasping up at him, blood painting his teeth red. He holds out his hand, closed in a fist; Steve grabs for it, and Fury slips a drive into his hand. “Don’t. Trust anyone.” and then he loses consciousness. 

Steve’s door bangs open and Sharon calls out, “Captain Rogers?”

“In here,” he replies. 

“Captain, I’m Agent 13 of SHIELD special service, I’ve been tasked with your protection —” 

“I know,” he slings his shield onto his back. 

Sharon turns the corner with her gun drawn and her eyes widen when they land on Nick. “Oh my god,” she brings her fingers to her ear. “Foxtrot is down, I need an EMT.”

_ “Do you have a twenty on the shooter?” _Steve hears the reply through her comm.

Steve turns to his window and sees a shadow move on the roof across the street. A shadow with a silver fucking arm. “I’m on it.”

❖

The chase doesn’t last very long. Bucky is fast, but not faster than Steve. The moment they’re both on the same roof, Steve throws his shield, hoping to at least knock him down — _ come on, come on Buck — _ but all he does his turn around _ (left foot first, shoulders thrown back, confident) _ and grab the shield in mid-air, full stop. 

His hair is longer, his shoulders are wider, he’s older. They’re both so much fucking older. 

Bucky whips the shield back at him, the force of his throw making his left arm _ click _ and whir. Steve catches it before it can break him in half, but when he looks up, the Winter Soldier is already gone. _ Mission complete. _

❖

“Don’t do this to me, Nick. Don’t do this —”

_ “Three, two, one: Clear!” _

_ “Pulse?” _

Steve puts his arm around Nat’s shoulders. “Don’t do this to me, Nick.”

_ “No pulse.” _

**HISTORY**

❖

Sharon is just leaving Pierce’s office when Steve steps out of the elevator. She freezes for a moment when she sees him, her face flushing the tiniest bit, but before she can say anything, Steve cuts her off. “It’s fine, Agent. You were just doing your job.”

She gives him an assessing look, probably trying to figure out if he actually means it; finding nothing — because it’s truly how Steve feels — Sharon relaxes her posture and sighs, looking down at her feet, mouth pressed into a thin line. “Putting me on the job was probably still not the wisest move we could have played.”

Steve dips his head in acknowledgement. “What’s done is done. It’s water under the bridge, as far as I’m concerned,” he tells her. “And as for what happened last night, you did your best. Job well done, Agent.”

She gives him a small, sad smile. “I’ll see you around, Captain.”

She steps into the elevator, and Steve watches the door close before he turns to Pierce’s office. _ Sharon can’t be HYDRA. There is no way. _

Faced now with the prospect of finally meeting Alexander Pierce face to face, Steve takes a deep breath in order to try and keep his nerves under wraps. 

He knocks, and a voice on the other side of the door calls, _ come on in. _

The office is large and spacious with minimal furniture. There are windows along the entire back wall, floor to ceiling, with a view of the Potomac. Alexander Pierce stands in the middle of it, his hands in his pockets and a smile on his face. 

“Captain Rogers. It’s so good to finally meet you.”

Pierce is composed in a way that only someone who’s been in charge for years can be, with arrogance rolling off of him in waves. He is wearing a tailored suit in warm neutrals that do nothing to mask the coldness of his demeanor from Steve. “I’m Alexander Pierce.”

❖

** _1943_ **

_ Steve steps out the tank, chest heaving. He’s taller, larger, stronger than he could have ever imagined. He can hear every pinprick of noise, can see every colour — _ that’s blue, orange, that’s grey, but with a purple undertone, that’s red — _ red, the red of Peggy’s lipstick, pulled down in a frown. He looks up to meet her gaze, an unreadable look in her eyes. _

I can do it now, Pegs, _ he thinks. _This body will help me get to where I need to be.

_ “How are you feeling?” she asks, hand reaching out but hesitating an inch from his skin. _

_ “Taller,” he replies, honest. And hot; he feels hot, like he’s burning, like he can burn everything around them down with him. _

_ Alexander Pierce does not know what he has created. _

❖

“It’s an honour to meet you, sir,” Steve replies, holding out his hand. Pierce’s hand is cold when he takes it. He is smiling at Steve with a detached gentleness that makes a shiver run down his spine. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

_ This is the man that knows where Bucky is, right now. This is the man that has been hurting him. This is the man that had ordered his colleague shot down, and used Bucky to do it. _

Pierce only shakes his head, expression grim. “Nick Fury and I go way back. It’s probably not what a lot of people are expecting to hear after something like this happens, but — with the jobs we have, I’m surprised we lasted this long. It’s a dangerous life, working to protect mankind,” he says, looking up and walking to Steve. He lifts a hand to lay on his shoulder, expression searching. “Care for a drink? No? Well,” he lets go and turns to the low couches set across from each other in front of his desk. He sits, and gestures for Steve to do the same. 

“My father served in the 101st. It is so surreal to be speaking with you. But I digress — That photo there,” he points to the small thing on his desk, turned towards them, “was taken five years after Nick and I met. When I was at State Department in Bogota. ELN rebels took the embassy, and security got me out, but the rebels took hostages. Nick was deputy chief for the SHIELD station there. And he comes to me with a plan. He wants to storm the building through the sewers. I said, ‘No, we'll negotiate.’ Turned out the ELN didn't negotiate, so they put out a kill order. They stormed the basement, and what did they find? They find it empty. Nick had ignored my direct order and carried out an unauthorized military operation on foreign soil. He saved the lives of a dozen political officers, including my daughter.”

“So you gave him a promotion.” Steve doesn’t see why Pierce is telling him this.

“I've never had any cause to regret it,” he replies with a shrug. “Captain, why was Nick in your apartment last night?”

_ O-fucking-kay. _“I don't know.”

“You know it was bugged?”

“I did, because Nick told me.” 

“Did he tell you he was the one who bugged it?” _ Ah, so that’s your angle. Believe it or not, I fucking figured it was Nick Fury who bugged my apartment. _ “I want you to see something.”

Pierce picks up a remote and a holographic video feed pops up on the wall beside them. An Agent leans over a table, into the space of the man hunched over in the chair. “_ Who hired you, Batroc?” _

_ Batroc? From the ship? _“Is that live?”

“Yeah, they picked him up last night in a not-so-safe house in Algiers.”

“Are you saying he's a suspect? Assassination isn't Batroc's line.”

“No, it's more complicated than that. Batroc was hired anonymously to attack the Lemurian Star and he was contacted by e-mail and paid by wire transfer. And then the money was run through seventeen fictitious accounts, the last one going to a holding company that was registered to a Jacob Veech.”

“Am I supposed to know who that is?”

“Not likely. Veech died six years ago. His last address was 14-35 Elmhurst Drive. When I first met Nick his mother lived at 14-37.”

“Are you saying Fury hired the pirates? Why?”

“The prevailing theory was that the hijacking was a cover for the acquisition and sale of classified intelligence. The sale went sour and that led to Nick's death.

“If you really knew Nick Fury, you'd know that's not true.”

“Why do you think we're talking? See, I took a seat on the Council not because I wanted to but because Nick asked me to, because we were both realists. We knew that despite all the diplomacy and the handshaking and the rhetoric, that to build a really better world sometimes means having to tear the old one down. And that makes enemies. Those people that call you dirty because you got the guts to stick your hands in the mud and try to build something better. And the idea that those people could be happy today, makes me really, really angry. Captain, you were the last one to see Nick alive. I don't think that's an accident, and I don't think you do either. So I'm gonna ask again, why was he there?”

“He told me not to trust anyone.”

“I wonder if that included him.” Pierce’s expression is unreadable.

Steve stands up from the couch and picks up his shield. “I'm sorry. Those were his last words. Excuse me.”

“Captain.” Steve stops a few steps from the door to look at Pierce. “Somebody murdered my friend,” _ yeah, fuckface, _ someone _ sure did. _ “And I'm gonna find out why. Anyone gets in my way, they're gonna regret it. Anyone.”

“Understood.” Steve closes the door behind him. 

❖

Rumlow steps into the elevator looking almost giddy, rolling his shoulders. “Hey, Cap.”

Steve suppresses a sigh. 

❖

“So,” Natasha starts, kicking her feet up onto the dash. “Where did Captain America learn how to steal a car?”

“Nazi Germany. Practically the same time I learned to drive one, too.”

“Mhm. It shows.”

“You choose to complain about my driving _ now? _ After everything we’ve been through?”

She laughs, sliding her feet back onto the floor when Steve smacks her legs. “Alright, I have a question for you, oh, which you do not have to answer. I feel like if you don't answer it though, you're kind of answering it, you know?”

He sighs, already knowing what she wants to ask. “_ What?” _

“Was that your first kiss since 1945?” and yup, there it is, and Natasha is wearing maybe the most gleeful expression on her face Steve has ever seen.

“Fuck off, Nat,” he says. Pauses. “That bad, huh.”

Natasha practically _ crows. _“I did not say that!”

“Well, it kind of sounds like that's what you're saying.” _ I think maybe I would be bad for anyone that’s not Buck. _

“No, I didn't. I just wondered how much practice you've had.”

Steve gives her a _ look. _ “You know how much practice I’ve had, Nat. You ask practically every weekend in some form or another.”

“Because you’re a lonely bastard, Steve. And you never wash your dishes.”

“You really need to get over the dishes thing, seriously. Besides, Buck used to wash the dishes,” he says, without thought. “Hot soapy water used to make my hands dry up and crack.”

Steve’s brain catches up with what he just said and he winces at the resulting silence. 

“Bucky, huh.”

Instead of saying _ yeah, Bucky, love of my fucking life and the Winter Fucking Soldier, _he says “Even when I had nothing, I had Bucky.”

Which is so much fucking worse.

But all Nat says is “He was your family.”

“Yeah,” he says. “All I had, after Ma died. And his sisters, of course. Sami and Becca.”

“Look at all of those people! Why are you so lonely now, Rogers?”

He smiles at nothing, eyes on the road. “Believe it or not, it’s kind of hard to find someone with shared life experience.”

Natasha makes an offended noise. “Russia, ice block?”

His smile is a bit more genuine, now. “I thought you didn’t like that idea.”

“Yeah, well, it turns out when you’re a trained-from-birth soviet spy there aren’t a whole lot of _ shared-life-experiences _to be had. I’ll take what I can get.”

❖

“This is it,” he says as they pull up to Camp Lehigh. 

“The place that started it all,” Natasha says, offhandedly.

_ Not quite the beginning. _They jump the fence and keep low, even if the camp’s been long abandoned. Natasha goes around poking and prodding things, probably just to annoy Steve. 

“I’m a super spy, Rogers. I don’t need to explain my methods.”

“Isn’t there a saying about methods and madness?”

“Has it changed much?” she asks, once she’s checked all the buildings in the north end. They were all locked.

Steve had checked the south end of camp, and all of those barracks were abandoned, too. “Not much. See that flag pole? Got me a ticket out of running a marathon.” 

“Because it fell over and hit you in the head?”

But Steve is already looking past her, frowning. “Actually,” he steps around her, looking at the layout of the camp from their perspective in the middle. They start walking. “Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks. That building’s in the wrong fucking place.”

Steve knocks the padlock off the door with his shield, nearly ripping the metal door off the hinges with the force of his swing. 

Dust rises with every step they take inside; for the most part, it looks as though one day everyone just got up and left. There are coffee mugs on desks, chairs pushed away from their spots, pens with chewed caps in jars. There are three framed photos on the wall: Howard, Peggy, and Phillips. 

“Ah,” he realizes. “This is SHIELD.”

“The start of it, anyways,” Natasha says, swiping her finger across a shelf. She scrunches her nose at the pile of dust that’s left on her finger. 

Steve shakes his head at her, like _ what’d you fucking expect?, _and she goes right up to him and wipes it clean on his jacket. “Ugh.”

“Get a move on, Captain. We’re fugitives and we don’t have time to fucking mess around.”

They don’t find anything under the dust, but walking between the bookshelves Steve does feel a draft; _ huh, _ he thinks, _ what’s this? _ He feels along the books, waiting for that telltale give, and — _ aha. _“Nat,” he calls, and she pokes her head around the end of the bookshelf. “Super secret elevator for a super secret spy.”

Both the bookshelf and the elevator door slides out of the way, but without the fanfare you would expect of something long-abandoned; there is no creaking, no groaning. 

It makes Steve stand a little straighter; a shiver goes down his spine.

The room that the elevator opens up to is larger than the actual ammunition locker; it might even spread out under most of the camp. Steve recognizes the machines standing in rows and rows and rows as computers, but only because he saw pictures of them from the 70s in one of SHIELD’s _ Adjusting to the Twenty-First Fucking Century 101 _binders. 

“This technology is ancient,” Natasha says, looking around with her hands on her hips. She stops suddenly, walking towards the central table. “Except for this guy.”

And yeah, _ bingo, _there’s a USB port just minding its own business, not covered in any dust. 

Natasha just goes right up to it and plugs Fury’s drive right in, and the computer flickers to life. _ Initiate Systems? _

“Y-E-S spells _ yes,” _ she narrates, but they’re met only with silence after she hits enter. “Hm.”

_ “Rogers, Steven Grant. Born 1918. Romanova, Natalia Alianovna. Born 1984,” _ the voice is tinny, robotic, accented. _ It’s — German? Swiss? _ Steve thinks, and _ oh fuck, oh for fuck’s sake — _

“It’s a recording.” Natasha says, unimpressed.

_ “I am no recording, Fraulein. I may not be the same man Captain Rogers took prisoner in 1945, but I _am.” The screen flickers again, and Arnim’s Zola’s face pops up onto the screen.

_ Motherfucker, _ he thinks. Then, _ Sorry, Ma. _

Natasha frowns. “Do you know this thing?” 

❖

“ — _ 570\. James Barnes. Sergeant. 32… 550…—” _

❖

“Arnim Zola. Scientist who worked with Redskull. Insane piece of shit. I thought he died years ago.” 

Natasha arches a brow at his language, but otherwise doesn’t react.

_ “My body did fail me, yes, but Captain, I have never been more alive! Look around you. Science has preserved my mind. This entire base is home to my brain.” _

And it’s not a stretch to think that if Zola has been here since at least the 70s, then HYDRA has been here since then, too. _ God fucking dammit. _But what possible reason could have convinced SHIELD to open their doors in the first place? 

He looks at Natasha, and as though she’s reading his mind, she says “Operation Paperclip, most likely. SHIELD recruited German scientists with strategic value, after WWII.”

_ And I’m not going to ask what kind of strategic value they were thinking of. _

_ Seventy fucking years, Buck. _

_ “They thought I could help their cause. I also helped my own. Cut off one head, two more shall grow in its place, after all. A parasite, growing and feeding for seventy years.” _

Natasha jumps back as though burned. “That’s impossible. SHIELD would have stopped you.”

_ “Accidents happen,” _Zola says, and Steve can see it, can see how easily it could have been working from the inside to make things disappear, to feed information in this ear and that ear and kill this person now and that person then — 

On the computer screen, images are flashing in quick succession: newspaper headlines; Redskull; the image of a car, pummelled and twisting around a tree. _ STARKS DEAD IN TRAGIC ACCIDENT. _

_ Oh, _ Steve’s heart breaks. _ Oh, Bucky. _

The image of Fury with an X across his face isn’t a surprise, but it still hurts. 

_ “You see? HYDRA has been here all along, creating chaos. Ruling humanity through it. We have won, Captain. Project Insight is our throne.” _

“Steve,” Natasha says, urgent. “We have a bogey. Short range ballistic. We have a minute, 90 seconds, tops.”

_ “Ah, yes. I am afraid I have been stalling. Our time has ended, Captain. Widow. It is time for a new era.” _

“Steve. We need to leave.” Natasha is pulling on his arm. It’s too late, the doors are all already closing behind them, sealing them inside. 

“Time,” Steve has to laugh. _ “Time.” _ How fucking hilarious. There is never enough fucking _ time. _ “Since we’re all going to die soon,” which, yeah, _ no fucking way, _“I might as well share a secret with you.”

_ “Why not?” _Zola sounds amused. He won’t be for long.

Steve looks right at his stupid little camera. “A few months ago I tracked down Vasily Karpov.” 

_ “...oh?” _Zola recognizes the name, that’s for sure. Steve’s grin is sharp.

“It would be so much easier for you fuckers to have hidden your trail if you all got along and weren’t so hell-bent on one-upping each other. I took what I needed from him and I set it all on 

fire.”

_ “Cut off one head, two more shall grow in its place, Captain. It does not change anything.” _

He walks right up to the desk, leaning in so that Natasha won’t be able to hear. “Project Eclipse was a success. Project Insight isn’t your throne, it’s just kindling.” He steps back and grabs Natasha around the waist, turning his back to Zola. “And I promised someone that I’d burn it to the fucking ground.”

They dive under Steve’s shield, and the building collapses on top of them.

❖

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” 

“Yeah,” Steve replies, heaving himself up onto the balcony. They’re both covered in dirt and ash and blood, and they never did actually manage to return the truck they borrowed, even if it managed to drive all the way back to DC without dying like Steve was convinced it would. 

“Steve, you met this guy three days ago.” 

“He’s good people, Nat,” he assures her, and taps on the window. 

It takes a few minutes for Sam to come into view, still rumpled with sleep. He slides the window open. “What the fuck.”

“Morning,” Steve barrels on. “We need a place to lie low.”

“Everyone we know is trying to kill us,” Nat chimes in.

Sam just stares at them both, a frown maring his brow. He sighs and stands aside. “Not everyone. “

❖

Sam leans his head into the bedroom, a dish towel thrown over his shoulder. “Breakfast is ready, if you guys eat shit like that.”

“Thanks, Sam.”

He reaches over to punch Steve in the shoulder. “No worries, man. You guys look like you had a building dropped on you.”

Natasha hums. “Points for being observant, I guess.”

“Thank — wait, you’re not serious? That was a joke, you supersoldiers know what jokes are, right?”

_ “Net,” _she replies, hip-checking on the way to the kitchen. 

Steve makes a gagging noise. 

_ “Seen, not heard, Rogers!” _

❖

They’re spread out at the kitchen table, breakfast finished and dishes piled in a corner. Natasha leans back in her chair, balancing on the back two legs. “So, the question is: who in SHIELD could launch a domestic missile strike?”

“Pierce.” Natasha quirks a brow at the speed of his answer, but doesn’t say anything against it.

Sam looks up sharply. “You talking about undersecretary Alexander Pierce? The dude with a seat on the World Security Council?”

Natasha doesn’t bother to hide her grimace. “Who _ also _happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world.”

“But he's not working alone, Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star.”

“So was Jasper Sitwell.”

“So, the _ real _ question is: how do the two most wanted people in Washington kidnap a SHIELD officer in broad daylight?”

Sam looks between the two of them, shaking his head. He turns around opens a drawer, digging around in it and making a racket. “The answer,” he says, “ — _ aha, found you, mofo _ — is that you don't.” He pulls out a folder from the drawer and drops it onto the table.

“What's this?”

“Call it a resume.”

Natasha picks it up. “You keep your military resume in a drawer in your kitchen?”

“It’s the junk drawer,” Sam says, offended. “No one ever wants to look in someone else’s fucking junk drawer.”

She hums, slipping through it. She looks surprised by what she finds. “Is this Bakhmala? The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you.” She turns to Steve, showing him the photo in Sam’s file. “You didn't say he was a para-rescue.”

Steve takes it from her, tracing the image of the two men with his finger. One is obviously Sam, and the other is tall with sandy hair. “Is this Riley?”

“Yeah,” he replies with a smile. “Greatest partner a guy could ask for.”

“I heard they couldn't bring in the choppers because of the RPGs. What did you use, a stealth chute?”

“No.” He gestures for the file from Natasha, and flips through it more until he finds what he’s looking for. He pulls out a file and hands it to Steve. “These.” 

_ Huh. _“I thought you said you were a pilot.

Sam grins at him. “I never said pilot.”

_ How did all of this happen? I don’t deserve any of these people. _“I can't ask you to do this, Sam. You got out for a good reason.”

_ Soon, I have to tell the truth soon. _Steve can feel it. 

“Dude, Captain America needs my help. There's no better reason to get back in.”

Steve looks down at the picture of Sam in his wings. _ PROJECT FALCON _is stamped in red across the top of the file. “Where can we get our hands on one of these things?”

“The last one is at Fort Meade, behind three guarded gates and a twelve-inch steel wall.”

Steve looks over at Natasha, who’s got a dangerous smile on her face. “Sounds like it’ll be the highlight of my week.”

“You’re awful,” he tells her. “But it shouldn’t be a problem.” 

❖

“Oh my god, this is awful. This is so awful. HYDRA hates leaks, I’m going to die.” Sitwell is sweating buckets in the seat next to Steve, and it’s only the force of his will that keeps him from plugging his nose. _ HYDRA fear-sweat, so fucking gross. _

Sam’s eyes are on the road, knuckles white on the wheel. “Well then why don’t you put a cork in it, fuckface?”

“Is this how we’re going to spend the next twenty hours? I’ll just leave now.”

“We’re on the expressway, Nat, can you wait fifteen minutes?” Steve catches Sam’s eye in the rearview mirror. “It’ll be fine. We’ll use his DNA to bypass security and stop the helicarriers before they launch.”

“What? _ What?! _ You guys are _ crazy. _Rogers, I hope The Asse —”

Steve doesn’t get to hear what Sitwell hopes The Asset will do to him, thank god, because he doesn’t think he’d be able to keep his cool at all at that point, but Sitwell’s timing turns out to be pretty fucking impecable when he’s cut off by the _ thump _of a body on the roof, and a metal arm ripping Sitwell’s door off of the car. The Winter Soldier reaches inside the car and grabs him by the shirt and whips Sitwell into oncoming traffic.

_ Poor fucker, _Steve thinks, just a little gleeful. 

_ “Shit!” _ Sam yells in the front seat, having the steering wheel ripped right out of his hands by The Winter Soldier punching through the roof. _ “What the fuck!” _

_ Okay, game time. _ So far, Steve’s best plan to find Bucky had been to beat his location out of any and all HYDRA thugs he could find, but this works too _ . _ He just has to make sure to keep Sam and Natasha safe and out of the way. Steve has to get through to Bucky.

Natasha is shooting Bucky through the roof, but he’s already jumped on the car behind them. Without steering, the car begins to veer into the other lanes and Steve is grabbing the two of them, yelling _ “Hold on!” _and jumps out of the car, tucking the shield between them and the door, sliding across the pavement and leaving a trail of sparks. 

Sam is knocked away when they slam into the pavement and rolls off in one direction, while Steve and Natasha keep going until they hit a stopped car; they roll to their feet immediately, but before Steve can even get a good look at Bucky he’s staring down the barrel of a _ fucking rocket launcher alright then _and he’s shoving Natasha out of the way right before he’s got the shield up and is blasted right off of the fucking highway and into a bus.

“Fuck,” he tries to stand but his lungs aren’t working properly — the bus had flipped and was hit by a semi, and there’s someone crying behind him, and he has to get these people off of the bus and to safety — 

Bullets start punching through the metal frame, and Steve realizes that there isn’t time to evacuate these people, not if he actually wants to stop the HYDRA agents. _ I’m sorry, I’m sorry, _he thinks as he shimmies through one of the broken windows; the glass breaks the skin of his belly as he climbs out, but he can tell that the cuts are shallow. 

People are running and screaming as guns rain down bullets from the overpass and from the men on the ground. _ What the fuck are they doing? This is not subtle. Are we not going for subtlety? How are they going to play off a mass-shooting as a ‘let’s capture Captain America and his friends’? _

But Sam is taking care of the bastards on the overpass and on the cars, so Steve goes after Bucky. He weaves through the abandoned cars and spots him just in time to stop him from firing a grenade at Natasha.

_ God fucking dammit. _He whips his shield at him to knock the gun off course, and they begin to fight.

Fighting Bucky is unlike anything Steve has ever experienced. It’s body, mind, soul, and _ oh my god my fucking heart what have they done, Buck, sweetheart, _and he knows that if he slips up now he’s dead. There is no wasted movement, no hesitation, no fear — just strength and speed and machinery. 

_ “Bucky,” _he says, trying to keep his voice down. “Buck,” Steve ducks under his swinging metal fist. “Look at me.”

Bucky had been wearing goggles when he had first attacked on the highway, but they’ve been lost in the scuffle. The smoothness of his movements and attacks are countered by the madness in his eyes; they’re wide and rimmed red, and when Steve tries again to call out to him, Bucky begins to become frantic. 

_ “You know me,” _he hisses in between taking a hit to his cheekbone and a knife to the shoulder. “Bucky, doll —” 

_ “No,” _ he growls, and it sounds distorted through the mask. _ “You’re my mission.” _

Steve tries to corral their fight into an alley, somewhere where Steve can try to get through to him without an audience, but in the process of giving ground he’s also given Bucky openings to attack; Steve can feel a few of his ribs have cracked, and he’s been stabbed in the thigh and in his left side. _ How many freakin knives are you going to pull out of your ass, you jerk. _

In an enclosed space, Steve somehow manages to gain the upperhand; they’re on the ground, and Steve has got Bucky’s arm strained in the wrong direction. Bucky is panicking, grunting and trying to escape his grip. “Look at me!”

_ “No!” _

_ “Look at me!” _He needs to be one hundred percent certain that he has Bucky’s full attention. It’s the only way they’re both going to be able to get out of this. 

_ “No!” _

Steve dislocates his arm. Bucky screams, and it breaks Steve’s heart, but the sound is covered by the gunfire still happening in the streets. “I need you to listen to me.”

Bucky is panting, eyes rolling in his head. He’s muttering to himself in russian. “Bucky.”

His eyes stop when they meet Steve’s. “I don’t — I don’t know who that is.”

The relief could probably make Steve’s chest collapse in on itself if he let it. He lets go of Bucky’s arm, but keeps his palm flat over Bucky’s chest. _ I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. _ “That’s ok. That’s ok, sweetheart.”

Bucky’s chest is heaving. “You — _ you —” _

“Shh — Doll, do you remember me?” Bucky only gasps in response. “That’s ok, too. That’s alright, but —”

_ “You —” _ He chokes through the mask. _ “Burn? You —” _

“I made a promise,” he whispers to Bucky. “And I intend to keep it. ‘Til the end of the line, sweetheart.” 

Bucky goes still. His eyes are almost clear when he twists to look at Steve. 

“I need to tell you something, and I need you to understand, alright? It’s important that we get this _ right. _”

Steve notices that the gunfire has mostly stopped, and now mostly the noise coming from the streets are stomping and the beat of helicopter propellers. They probably have less than a minute before someone finds them.

Bucky watches Steve the same way he did back in 1942, hanging on to every word. Steve doesn’t hesitate now to bring his right hand up to touch Bucky’s cheek. _ We might make it out of here, Buck. _

There are agents at the opening of alley now, and Bucky is moving before Steve can react. His left elbow is slammed into the wound in Steve’s side, and as Steve cries out and folds in on himself instinctively, Bucky slips out of his hold and onto one knee. He doesn’t stop moving, and Steve knows what’s going to happen before it does, seeing the way Bucky is winding up his arm — but just before he swings, he says _ I understand. _

Hope flares, and then pain, and then nothing. 

**INTERLUDE: I KNOW HIM**

❖

Steve had only been knocked out for a couple of minutes, which was lucky for them since it would have made their escape from the SHIELD vehicles much more complicated. Even with Sam, Natasha, and Agent Hill, manhandling an unconscious supersoldier wouldn’t have been an easy task. 

And now they’re sitting at a table, nursing their wounds and staring down a breathing Nick Fury. 

“Any attempt on the Director’s life had to look like it was a success,” Hill explains.

“Can’t be killed when you’re already dead.” Fury deadpans. “Besides, I didn’t know who I could trust.”

_ Ah, shit, _ Steve thinks. _ What a goddamn bastard. _

❖

“I saw you fighting the Soldier. You were nearly equals.” Natasha is leaning against the doorframe of Steve’s room, which is really just a closet with an extra-long cot in it. “So why the fuck are you so beaten up, Rogers?”

“I had to give him a message.”

Natasha pushes off of the wall, her expression one of incredulous anger. “You had to give _ the Winter Soldier _a message?”

And there are so many things that Steve could tell her, so many things that he could try to explain, but there are no words that make themselves available in his head. Nothing that could accurately explain the personal hell that came stumbling into that alley in 1942. So, instead, he just says “It’s Bucky.”

And just like that, she shuts down. “What.”

“The Winter Soldier, The Asset, The American, whatever codename you want to call him, it’s Bucky.”

She narrows her eyes at him and breathes out slowly through her nose. “Barnes has been dead for seventy years, Steve. You can’t know it’s him.”

He gets up off the bed and steps behind her to close the door. She watches as he leans back against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest. “Well?”

“You said I act as though I woke up with a mission.”

She looks up at him, eyes widening in surprise. 

“I did, in a way. I didn’t realize at first, because — well, seventy years had gone by. _ Seventy fucking years. _It wasn’t until I went to visit Peggy that I started to wonder if it all worked out the way it was supposed to, in the end.”

“What do you mean?”

“I asked you, on the way back to New York, what you knew about Alexander Pierce.”

Her gaze sharpens. “You’ve known all of this time?”

“That he was HYDRA?” Steve shakes his head. “No. All I knew what that he was the one hurting Bucky.”

“And _ how _did you know that?”

Steve sighs, looking down at his feet. He needs to tell her, he _ wants _ to tell her, but everything still hurts and he feels like he’s been rubbed raw and he just wants to _ scream — _ “Nat, I don’t —”

She shoves him into the wall, getting in his face. “Don’t fucking finish that sentence. I don’t have time for _ I don’t know. _ Steve, _ we _ don’t have time for it. I need to know _ how you know, _ Rogers, _ right now.” _

_ “Get your hands off of me,” _ he hisses, and he can’t feel bad for snapping at her. “I wasn’t going to fucking say _ I don’t know.” _

“Then what, Steve? I understand secrets, Steve, but _ the Winter Soldier? _”

“He’s my _ husband!” _he yells, not caring that the others can probably hear them now. “He’s my husband and I promised I’d take him home no matter how long it takes.”

Natasha is gaping at him, seemingly shocked into silence. She takes her hands off of him and steps back, allowing them both some breathing room. “I’m sorry,” she says, and something in her expression hardens. “But Steve, he’s probably not —”

_ “No,” _he cuts her off. “He’s in there, Nat. He’s still in there.”

She throws her hands up. “I still don’t even know _ how _ you know it’s him.”

“I met the Winter Soldier for the first time in 1942,” he says. 

“That’s not possible. You knew _ Barnes _in 1942.”

He barrels on. “I found him just standing by himself in an alley. He didn’t really — _ understand _ where he was, but he _ knew _ where he was, and he knew who I was but didn’t _ remember _ me. I took him home,” he shrugs at Natasha’s incredulity. “Past, present, future, I know Bucky Barnes, Nat. And that — well. Bucky’s definitely still in there, Nat. You need to believe me.”

She sits on Steve’s cot, and he drops down next to her. “How? You’re telling the truth, but _ how?” _

“He was with me for three days. I convinced him to tell me what was wrong, or a name of someone I could track down.

“He said ‘Alexander Pierce’, and ‘Project Eclipse’.”

❖

_ I knew him, _ the Asset thinks. He ignores the technicians working on his arm; the Asset knows that paying attention to technicians when not directly spoken to only means punishment. _ I knew him. _ But what does that mean? The Asset knows that he must follow orders, and that he must complete missions seamlessly. _ I knew him. _ The Asset knows that he is the fist of HYDRA, and that he has shaped the century. _ But I _ knew _ him. How? _

The sudden shock of pain in his head makes his whole body stiffen. _ The Asset is seated on a cot, and the wallpaper is peeling; the table is a tub with a board placed flat on top. Beside the Asset, _ _ Stevie _ _ holds his metal arm, he cradles it, he looks at the Asset with kindness and he knows that _—

You burn the world, Stevie

But no one can ever know. 

_ Written on a small piece of paper, written with the Asset’s hand. The dizziness has gotten worse, and somehow the Asset knows that it is almost time to report, that the Asset will be taken away from _ _ Steve, _ _ but it’s ok, because the Asset knows, he _ knows _ now, but he must keep it a secret, because he knows that it is right, that no one can know that he _knows — 

“Soldier, report.”

The Asset blinks, and he is back in the vault. _ What is it that no one can know? _The Asset wonders. 

“Mission report, Soldier.”

The Asset looks up and meets the eyes of — 

_ Can you tell me who’s hurtin’ you, Buck? _

His handler stares back down at him, expressionless, like the Asset.

“Mission was unsuccessful. The man on the bridge —”

Eyes narrow, mouthes flatten, shoulders stiffen; technicians working on his arm falter, but the Asset does not stop talking, because _ I knew him, _ and _ no one can know. _

“ — as well as both other targets escaped. The Asset is functional.”

His handler stares down at him, blue eyes piercing, not the right shade of blue. “Alright. We’ll wait until after the launch tomorrow to wipe him. Then he’s going back in cryo.”

❖

Stevie told the Asset, _ I’ll find them, and bring you home. Wherever you are, Buck, wherever you are, I promise I’m going to bring you home. Wherever that takes me, it’s not the end of the line ‘til we’re both at home and safe, Buck. _

The man on the bridge told the Asset _ there’s a HYDRA Project, Buck, Project Eclipse. You know it? When it happens, and I don’t know if it’s already happened or not, sweetheart, but it’s important that whatever we do, we have to wait until you come back. It all has to come full circle. In 1942 you tell me I burn the world, doll, but listen, Buck — I need you to burn it too. We can’t go home just yet, but when it’s time, you set it all on fire so that I’ll know where to find you, and that I’ll know it’s time to come and get you. _

_ I’ll come and take you home. _

The Asset cannot forget this; he has less than twenty hours now before he will be brought to The Chair and he knows that once he is put in cryo before he — _ burns — _then he will not be found. He will not be taken home.

_ Home. _

There are only three technicians left in the room with him now, all busy filling in data on their computers with their backs turned to him. None of them seem to be worried that he would hurt them, and there is something not right about that. 

The Asset looks around the room as though it’s the first time — it might as well be, with this new level of awareness. He finds what he’s looking for in a matter of seconds; it’s unsurprising, since the vault was thrown together as a last minute base. The Asset was supposed to go into cryo after killing Nicholas Fury, but his handler had decided to send him up against Captain America.

It’s acetone, right there on the shelf. It would be easy enough to knock it over. The Asset knows all of the exits in this room, and the restraints are mostly just for decoration: he had never thought about breaking them before, but now when he tests them with subtle pulls of his wrist, he observes that they are weak. 

His handler is in the room down the hall. He can hear him speaking to the STRIKE team. 

_ How fast will he be? _ He wonders. _ Should I wait for him here, while the rest of them burn? _

Wait for Steve to come and take him home. 

_ Yes, _ the Asset thinks, _ I can wait for him here. _


	3. Part Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys for your patience!

**SIGNAL**

❖

Steve is reapplying his bandages when Natasha knocks on his door again. 

“Where are you planning on going?” She asks, frowning. 

“Out,” he replies, picking up his stealth suit from the cot.

“Steve.” She steps into the room. “You can’t go after him.”

“But I am, Nat.” He doesn’t bother hiding from her when he pulls on the suit. They’ve been working together in close quarters for much too long for modesty to matter now. “I’ve been chasing after him for seventy years.”

“Fury won’t let you out, not after that whole tantrum you threw earlier.”

_ He’s my husband! _

Yeah, Fury was not impressed. Fuck him.

“I have to go, Nat,” he repeats, exhausted. “This is all I have left.”

“That’s not actually true, but I get that Barnes is pretty important.” She scrutinizes him, and then finally she just shakes her head at her feet and sighs. “Yeah, alright. I can get you out without Fury noticing.”

He turns around to take her into a hug. She stiffens for a moment before lifting her arms to return the gesture, her whole body relaxing. 

“You’re a good friend, Rogers. One of the best.”

“And to think you were upset the first time I brought up the Russia-block of ice thing.”

“Steve,” she says, serious. She props her chin on his chest, looking up at him, eyes wide and sincere. “I’m happy for you. It’s all kind of a fucking mess, but I’m happy for you.”

Steve feels his throat close up, warmth bubbling in his chest. He leans down to press a kiss on Natasha’s forehead. “Thanks, Nat.” 

“I’m just happy that there’s someone out there who might finally clean your dishes.”

❖

“Steve,” Natasha pulls him away from the car they’re about to hotwire. “Here.”

Steve looks down at the coordinates scribbled on the scrap piece of paper in his hand. “Nat?”

“It’s clean. Only Clint and I know about the place: only an hour out of the city. You can send him there.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Steve,” she takes his hand in hers. “I want to, you lonely fuck.”

Relief threatens to overwhelm him. “Thank you,” he breathes. “I don’t know if he’ll trust it, but just having this option —”

“If it doesn’t work, I can find something else.” 

“Thanks, Nat.”

“Sam and I will keep Fury from coming after you; we’ll work on a way to get into the Triskelion tomorrow morning. That should keep him distracted.”

“Hopefully I’ll be back before then.”

❖

The radio blares static, occasionally picking up police signals, but nothing that grabs Steve’s attention; he sighs and lowers himself into a crouch, watching DC under the cover of darkness.  _ Nothing yet. Just have to be patient.  _

Steve has been out for nearly an hour now; two hours since they arrived in Fury and Hill’s hideout, nearly that long since Steve told Natasha the truth. It’s sixteen hours to launch time.  _ Come on, Buck, sweetheart.  _

The world hasn’t stopped turning, nothing has gone to even more shit than it already has, and Steve figures that maybe he could have told Natasha before now. But it still has barely even been a year since Steve woke up. 

Not even a year ago he watched Bucky fall off of the train.  _ Seventy fucking years later. _

He stiffens at the sound of his comm connecting to another signal, and he waits for a tense moment to find out who is online.  _ Please don’t be Fury, please don’t be Fury.  _

_ “Hello? Is this the paleontology department of the Smithsonian?“ _

“Nat,” he sighs, slumping in relief. “Don’t fucking scare me like that.” She hums, and Steve can hear her fingers flying over a keyboard. “You’ve got eyes on…?”

_ “Most of downtown. What are you listening to? You have shitty taste in music.” _

Unwittingly, Steve’s mouth curls up in a smile. The police signal gives another burst of static. “You have a shitty sense of humour.”

_ “What are we waiting for? I might be able to narrow it down from all of downtown.” _

He sighs again, shoulders dropping. “A fire, hopefully.”

He can practically  _ hear _ her eyebrows climbing to her hairline, but thankfully she doesn’t say anything about it. At least not until after she’s narrowed her search on the surveillance cameras. 

“A fire, huh.”

“We do this thing where we burn stuff down for each other.”

“Kinky. You’ve got hidden depths, Rogers.”

“I go to that club on Memorial every other Thursday.”

“You do not,” she says, and Steve hears Sam choking in the background. “I would remember seeing you decked out in leather and chains.”

❖

_ [“911, what is your emergency?”] _

_ [“Hi, yes, I think there’s a fire —”] _

_ [“Where is the fire, sir?”] _

_ [“The old bank of America, on Lincoln — I can’t see any flames, but there’s smoke coming out of the windows.”] _

_ [“Alright, sir, can you tell me where you are? Are you a safe distance away?”] _

_ [“I’m at the bus stop across the street.”] _

❖

Steve lifts his face to the air. “I smell smoke, coming south.”

_ “There was just a 911 call about a fire in an old Bank of America building on Lincoln.” _ Natasha types something, pauses.  _ “That bank hasn’t been used in six years.” _

Steve’s heart begins to pound. “It’s him.”

_ “Go get him, tiger. I’ll be keeping watch.” _

❖

The Asset’s lungs are burning.

Not in the same way that the technicians’ lungs are burning;  _ they _ are curled on the floor, hands clawing at their throats as they suffocate on smoke from a chemical fire. The Asset’s lungs are burning because he has been holding his breath for six minutes.

_ Eleven minutes and twenty-four seconds,  _ ticks the countdown in his head. That is plenty of time for what the Asset needs to do. 

The STRIKE team, when surprised and unprepared for a chemical attack, are easy enough to subdue, even with the injuries sustained from fighting  Steve , and once he leaves his secondary handler heaving on the ground with his face blistering from the heat, all that’s left is his primary handler. 

The Asset’s primary handler is stumbling down the hallway, not as young as he once was, his body betraying him in the smoke and the heat and the poison. The Asset remembers how  Stevie’s body would fail him, and he remembers the man on the bridge’s strength, and the Asset doesn’t need to run to catch up to his handler’s crumbling form. 

_ I will go home. I can go home. I have a home. _

The Asset grabs his handler by the throat; his eyes are the wrong shade of blue.  _ Who’s hurtin’ you, Buck?  _ And the Asset pries his handler’s mouth open and uses his left hand —  _ fist of HYDRA —  _ to reach inside and pull the molars from his handler’s jaw.  _ Cyanide: the HYDRA can only kill itself. The Asset is the fist of HYDRA.  _

But the Asset _knew him._ And the Asset told Steve that he _burns, _so they _will_ burn like the Asset knows they can. Like they _have_ burned. In his mind’s eye, the Asset sees a factory that he’s never been to, maybe, burning in the night, and there is warmth at his back. The warmth is new but familiar, the heart beating against his skin is steady and strong and not weak and stubborn; the Asset sees a crooked spine, sees his own hand tracing the fragile curve of it. He sees a larger shape superimposed over it, two bodies home to the same soul, a home that the Asset would like to return to, _would like to return to, what does that mean? _

The Asset heaves his handler up the stairs, up up up until they reach the roof.  _ Three minutes and seventeen seconds.  _ He takes a breath. His handler is gasping at the Asset’s feet. 

The fire would have been reported by now, which means that it is most likely that  Steve is also on his way. 

The Asset is… 

_ Fuckin’ scared piece of shit punk — Stevie? _

“Soldier… s-stand down. Release me immediately,” his handler orders, but his speech is garbled from the blood filling his mouth. The Asset decides that he does not understand the words. He does not release his handler.  _ “Soldier. Release me.” _

“No,” he says, and the Asset is uncomfortable. His heart rate is elevated and his movements are sloppy. Bad? Good?  _ What does that mean? _ “I am going home.”

His handler smiles; his teeth are red. His face is swelling. “You don’t have a home, Soldier. Only HYDRA.” 

❖

Steve beats the first responders by a long shot, from the way he can only barely hear the sirens in the distance. By now Fury is probably sending Hill and whatever team of agents he’s got left, too.

He watches from the rooftop directly across from the bank, trying to decide whether or not he should go in to find Bucky or wait for him outside — thinking back on how their initial exchange had gone, he can’t be sure that Bucky will come out to meet him or just — wait.

But as soon as he thinks it, Steve hears a  _ bang _ from the roof across from him: two figures, one of them dragging the other along. Steve hears them gasp in the fresh air, and when they turn Steve sees the silver of Bucky’s arm glint in the streetlight. 

_ Buck. Bucky, sweetheart, doll.  _ Steve doesn’t realize until he’s gripping the brick by his fingers that he’s already climbing down the side of the building he’s on. He drops, rolling to absorb the shock of the landing and crossing the street towards the bank.  _ We’re so close, Buck. _

It’s easy enough to scale the bank with its architecture, and then all of a sudden he’s on the roof; Bucky has his back to Steve, but he can see around him that the figure on the ground is  _ fucking Alexander Pierce, bingo.  _ They must have been getting Bucky ready for the launch tomorrow. 

“He will come and take me home,” Bucky is telling Pierce. “He promised.”

Pierce spits blood onto the roof. “I don’t know who you’re talking about, Soldier. But I should have known this would happen. It’s not your fault your brain’s a mess, you know. We should have wiped you before now, Soldier. I was arrogant,” he says, sounding regretful. “Now  _ release me.”  _

Steve steps forward, and the crunch of his boots gets both of their attention. Bucky turns slowly, expression unreadable, but Pierce looks shocked. “You’re not going anywhere, Pierce.”

_ “Hill is on her way to take Pierce back to base.”  _

Steve doesn’t acknowledge Natasha’s comment, but he notices the way that Bucky stiffens at the sound of her voice. _ Alright, so he’s got the super-hearing thing, too. _

“Captain,” Pierce has composed himself, but barely. He doesn’t know how he’s going to get out of this one. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

“Oh, I do, Pierce. I’ve known for a very long time.” 

_ “Extraction in two minutes.”  _

“Buck,” Steve turns away from Pierce.  _ Fucker is dirt under my boot, fuck you, you asshole. Seventy whole fucking years.  _ “Come here?”

Bucky looks from Steve to Pierce and, clearly deciding that he  _ would _ like to go to Steve, Bucky turns around and knocks Pierce unconscious with one swing of his fist. Pierce crumples to the ground.

And then all there’s left is him and Bucky. If the two of them only have two minutes before Agent Hill arrives to take Pierce, there’s only a few minutes after that before the firefighters arrive; he reaches into his pocket to pull out the crumpled piece of paper from Natasha.

He holds it out to Bucky. “Here. As soon as I can, I’ll come and meet you here.”

He keeps his posture relaxed so that Bucky doesn’t get freaked out, but they still only have  _ one fucking minute, come on, Buck, please just take it,  _ and they’re at a standstill until they both hear the the sirens approaching from a few blocks away, and then Bucky steps forward to take the paper.

“Is this…” Bucky isn’t wearing the mask, and this is the first time this century that Steve has heard his voice unobstructed. He thinks that he might combust on the spot. “Home?”

“No,” he figures that the best option is to be as honest as possible; he needs Bucky to trust him. “It’s a place we can go to hide. And then we’ll find a home together.”

“Why aren’t we leaving together?” He doesn’t sound  _ lost, _ per say, but it’s enough to let Steve know that there are still bits of his heart left to break. 

“People saw our arrest earlier today, Buck. If I disappear out of nowhere right now, people will start looking and they won’t stop. We’ve got a plan that’ll let us disappear, doll. We can disappear for as long as we need.”

Bucky stares down at the paper for a moment before meeting Steve’s gaze. “You promise?”

There’s something more open about Bucky’s posture that wasn’t there a minute before, so Steve steps forward to cup Bucky’s face in his hands and touch their foreheads together. “Til the end of the line, Buck.”

“‘It’s not the end of the line ‘til we’re home and safe,’” Bucky echoes.

“We’re almost there, doll.”

Bucky nods against him, and when he steps back it only takes him a second to disappear completely.

_ Almost there, Buck. Thank you for trusting me. _

❖

Hill is just pulling the van up behind the bank when Steve finally manages to get his feet on the ground with Pierce thrown over his shoulder. He’s not sure when the man will wake up, with the smoke inhalation and the Winter Soldier sucker-punch, but he’s sure that Hill can get him checked out back at the base. 

As soon as the side door of the van opens, Steve dumps Pierce inside. Hill sticks her head out of the driver’s window, unimpressed. “Does that make you happy? Throwing unconscious old men around? He needs to be able to actually wake up, you know.”

“He’ll wake up,” Steve assures her. “If not on his own, then with a little bit of help from me.”

❖

Sam is waiting for them when they all get back to base. Steve lets the agents take Pierce out of the van and carry him inside, and he falls in step with Sam, walking shoulder to shoulder.

“So, I haven’t actually heard the whole story yet, but lemme get at least this part sorted out,” Sam isn’t looking directly at Steve, but he can still see the amused glint in his eye from his profile. “Is Captain America’s story actually a romance?”

It shocks a laugh out of Steve. Even just for that, Steve is so glad that he met Sam. “Steve Rogers’ story, for sure. Captain America seems to have been hijacked by the Republicans, though.”

“That’s a real fucking shame,” Sam replies. “I think I like Steve’s story a whole lot better.”

“I’m glad that you can make out something good in all of this,” Steve says, watching as agents bring Pierce into an interrogation room, a nurse making her way to meet them. “Because from my end, it feels like a fucking trainwreck.”

Sam stops walking, pulling Steve with him with a hand on his shoulder. His expression is serious and earnest and vulnerable and it has Steve rooted to the ground. “But it’s almost over, yeah? I was worried that he might not be the type to save, but it seems like the both of you have just been waiting for each other.”

Steve blinks down at his feet, not able to speak, so he nods instead. But Sam seems to get it, so he just pats Steve on the back and keeps walking.

❖

“The easiest way to take care of HYDRA now is to dump everything online,” Natasha says to the room. “There is no one left to initiate Insight, so we just need to get rid of everything else.”

“Excuse me?” Fury is not impressed. “Dumping HYDRA files means also dumping SHIELD files. We have to salvage what we can, we worked too hard for what we have —”

“It all has to go, Nick,” Steve cuts in. “I know how much work you put in to SHIELD and you were a good director, but it all has to go. There is no saving something that goes this deep.” 

Fury looks at every one of them, and Hill just shrugs when he gives her a pointed look. “I think he’s right, Nick. We can start over, but all of this? I think SHIELD needs to go.”

That seems to be what convinces Fury. He sighs, nodding. “Alright. Well, what do you all suggest we do?”

Natasha reaches down beside her chair to pull out a laptop. “We might as well get a head start on airing out all of our dirty laundry.”

❖

While Natasha works on the file dump, they left Pierce alone in the interrogation room for a few hours. The nurse has come and gone to treat the wound on his face, but otherwise no one has interacted with him. Now, Steve is observing him from the other side of mirrored glass. Pierce shows no sign of being uncomfortable, leaning back in his plastic chair in his designer suit with his eyes closed.

Fury comes into the room, stopping at Steve’s side. “You’re awfully quiet.”

“Is it not still common practice to stay quiet if you don’t have anything nice to say?”

Fury almost smiles. “You’d have a right to say something  _ not nice, _ Cap, what with your whole ‘dying to eradicate HYDRA’ thing.”

Steve nods his head in acquiescence, “Sure, that’s real fucking annoying, but you  _ know _ I’ve actually got a different bone to pick with Pierce. You can all go first, though.”

“Taking turns, huh. That’s generous of you,” Fury replies, his wry expression showing just how impressed he is by Steve’s  _ generosity. _

But Steve doesn’t take the bait; he keeps his eyes forward, focused on Pierce. “It’s the end for him, Nick. Everything I’ve done in the past four years, it’s been about ending him.”

_ Seventy years later. _

_ Seventy fucking years, Buck. _

“Didn’t know that was your style, Cap,” Fury keeps his tone even, but Steve can hear the surprise underneath it. 

Steve smiles at that, a little rueful. Instead of answering the implied question, he says “I have something I need to do. Natasha said she’ll text me when you guys are done.”

“Don’t know why I thought I was your boss,” Fury sighs, defeated. “You coming back?”

It’s not just a  _ you coming back to base?  _ question, Steve can tell. So he stops to think about it. 

“Yes,” he says eventually. “But hopefully it won’t be a long stay.”

❖

Waiting. Waiting and waiting and more waiting,  Stevie said that he won’t be long, that they can hide and then decide where they’re going to go, they’re going to  _ go home, goddammit Steve, let’s go home, let’s go dancing, Steve,  _ and the Asset has a clear view of the street in this apartment, but they cannot see him. It is a good safe house, well-stocked and clean and there are no bugs and there are no cameras anywhere in the building, but there is dog hair, which confuses the Asset, and irritates him, but he doesn’t know  _ why, Steve you can’t pet dogs, you’re allergic, you idiot punk Stevie,  _ oh.

The Asset does not think that Steve is allergic to dogs. Not now, not after  _ Project Rebirth, did you keep the costume?  _ So it does not matter. But the Asset cannot stop staring at all of the hair, and he needs to clean it, no, the Asset  _ wants to clean it up, it’s a mess, why is it a mess,  _ and he is so preoccupied trying to brush the dog hair from the ugly couch that he almost does not hear the creak in the hallway, but he does, the Asset hears the steps and he knows the steps and he knows  _ him, and he’s here, he’s come,  _ the Asset does not know what is wrong with him, he is sweating and his heart is pounding —

Stevie unlocks the door and steps inside. He is quiet, so quiet, but the Asset can hear him, can always hear Steve’s heart, beating strong and steady. “Hey,” he says, like this is easy. Like this is not the most difficult thing the Asset has done in — a long time  _ fuckin punk.  _

Steve notices that the Asset is sweeping the dog hair into a small pile, and for some reason it makes him smile, and the Asset feels everything in him twitch, jump,  _ smile again, smile smile smile again Stevie,  _ and Steve asks him, “Are you nervous, Buck?”

_ Yes, yes, how did you know, _ “How did you know?”

The Asset did not know that is what it was, this sweating and the way his heart is pounding, but once Steve said it, he knew that is was true, and it is thrilling. The Asset is  _ nervous.  _

“You always start cleaning when you’re nervous, Buck.” And Steve is smiling again, a little sad, but a smile is a smile is a smile.

And  _ oh, he knows me. This is something that I do.  _ “I knew you,” he tells Steve. “But you also know me.”

Steve kneels in front of him, he is so close, the Asset can feel the heat from his skin, can breathe him in, he  _ wants to get closer, Stevie come closer. _

And Steve reaches up to comb his fingers through the Asset’s hair, and he doesn’t care that this isn’t home yet, that they till have to plan and to hide and to run because  _ Steve is so close, he knows me, I knew him, I know him. _

❖

**SEVENTY FUCKING YEARS**

❖

Steve watches SHIELD and HYDRA collapse in on themselves from the outside.

With the file dump, Pierce has been revealed as the head of HYDRA, and the World Security Council is working hard trying to cover their asses by clamoring for his arrest, as well as that of the Black Widow and Captain America.

_ “They’ve leaked classified documents of the United States government.” _

Yeah, alright, whatever.  _ Let’s just put Nat and I on the same playing field as some fucking Nazis, why don’tcha. _

They don’t know, however, that they won’t ever get to arrest Pierce. It’s enough for Steve that all of his crimes have been revealed — or most of them, who the heck knows what Pierce got up to in his  _ personal _ time — and now the end is near; it’s the  _ light at the end of the tunnel  _ kind of thing. 

When the WSC gets a little too close, or a little too nosy, Nat tells him that Fury stepped into their line of fire to distract them; nothing like coming back from the dead to cause a little drama, Steve knows from experience. His situation is enough to keep the World Security Council arguing amongst themselves while Natasha and Hill take turns interrogating Pierce.

It goes on for nearly three days, three  _ fucking tense days,  _ Steve and Bucky wait for Natasha and Hill to finish tearing Pierce down. 

It’s an impressive amount of time, but Steve has seen Nat trick gods into giving her the information she wants, so he knew it was only a matter of time before Pierce gave in, even without meaning to.

On top of the data from the SHIELD dump, Nat relays that they got legal names to go with the codenames and aliases from mostly redacted documents, and some locations for significant meetings that Pierce has attended. Hill and Sam are already working on tracking everyone down.

_ [your turn, Rogers :)] _

❖

“You didn’t change your mind on your mini vacation, I take it,” Fury is glaring at him, but it won’t make Steve budge, not  _ now. _

So he just stares back at Fury, waiting for him to give Steve the OK. Fury only heaves a sigh, “That’s some grudge, Cap.”

Steve smiles. “He hurt my husband and thought he could get away with it.”

Fury narrows his eye at him. “You’re a fucking scary piece of work, Rogers.”

“Scary? I’m thinking more depressed, moody, maudlin, asshole,” Sam says, walking back into the room. Maria is behind him, and she waits for Natasha to step into the room before closing the door. “Stubborn, dramatic, hot-headed, whiny bitch ass motherfucking —”

“Rogers is going in to ask Pierce a few questions,” Fury tells them. 

Sam frowns, looking over at Steve. “You sure you want to do that, man?”

Steve ignores the way that Natasha is staring at him, and pushes himself to his feet. “Yup,” he heaves a sigh, crossing his arms over his chest and looking at Pierce. “I’ve been waiting a real fucking long time for this.”

“Steve.” Natasha grips his arm. She scrutinizes him for a whole minute, until she reaches behind her to pull her pistol out of its holster. “You can borrow Helga.”

He takes the gun; it’s so tiny in his hands. Deadly. “Why am I only finding out now that you name your weapons?”

“I also named your shield. You should only refer to it as Chad from now on.”

Steve makes an offended noise without meaning to. Natasha smirks at him. “When you stop squashing things with it like you’re a brute with no brains, I might consider changing its name.” 

“Thanks, I guess,” but he’s managed a small smile. 

“We’ll keep watch,” she replies when he steps away,  _ you’re welcome  _ loud and clear in the tone of her voice. “Don’t turn your comm off.”

Sam says  _ uh, wait a sec —  _ but Steve is already focused forward, nerves singing with the anticipation of what’s coming. A door closes behind him, cutting off the voices of his teammates; a door in front of him opens, and Alexander Pierce is not going to leave this room.

❖

Steve sits down across from Pierce and crosses his arms over his chest. He waits.

He can tell that Pierce is surprised to see him walk into the room, not expecting  _ Captain America _ to come in and interrogate him. He’s the  _ American Symbol of Truth, Justice and Family Values,  _ after all.  _ Ha fucking ha. _

Pierce doesn’t  _ squirm, _ exactly, but he starts to talk at the forty minute mark; Steve is expecting it, since in the end people like Pierce can’t help themselves. Men in power want to brag.

He makes digs about sneaking HYDRA into governments across the globe; about how it must have been so sad for Steve, to know that he really died for nothing at all; about how arrogant Steve had been, to think he had made the ultimate sacrifice, while really he just removed himself from the equation, letting HYDRA move on to bigger and greater things.

“You mean things like Project Eclipse?” Steve asks.

That brings Pierce to a stop, and Steve can see the way his words made him short-circuit. His mouth twitches,  _ a smile, a not-smile, a smile, play innocent, play not-innocent. _ “Excuse me?”

_ Ah. Playing dumb. Nice.  _ “Project Eclipse. I suppose it’s a fairly recent endeavor for HYDRA, but for me, it’s been on my mind for seven decades.” 

“I’m sorry, Captain Rogers, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You don’t? Well, that’s too bad. Makes a lot of things I’ve done redundant, really.”

“I can’t say I’m surprised to learn that once you get an idea in your head you become quite stubborn about following it through, Captain.”

Steve leans back in his chair, nodding in acquiescence. “I did go to quite an extreme. It wouldn’t even be a lie to say that it’s one of the reasons I signed up for Project Rebirth.”

“Quite a risk to take, Captain.” Pierce shifts in his chair. 

“Not really. I knew it would work. I knew that even though all of the previous experiments failed, that most of those soldiers ended up sick or dying, that I would be the one to make it. I would be the one to step out of that tank as the Project’s first and only success.”

“How arrogant of you.”

Steve grins. “Not arrogance, if it’s knowledge gained from a visit from the future.”

Pierce’s hands twitch, fingers stiffening and locking together.  _ Gotcha.  _

“Since I woke up, there have been a lot of people who’ve asked me what I was thinking in the moments before I stepped into that tank.  _ Before _ I woke up, people wrote  _ books _ about it. I’ve read a lot of them, been told about a lot more, but no one ever really comes close to the truth.” Steve pauses, leaning back in his chair and clasping his hands together in his lap. He watches Pierce until the man eventually turns away.

“I wonder,” Steve says, almost to himself. “If you found it funny, to send Bucky after the people I’m closest to now. If you thought it was funny sending him after  _ me.” _

He sits up, melancholy momentarily forgotten. “I will admit, you were a hard man to track down in the forties. Now I know it’s because you were a child, but it does mean you’ve got the longest SHIELD case file on record.”

He reaches to the folder to the right of him, letting it slide in front of him before he begins to flip through it. “I understand the not wanting to advertise that HYDRA managed to figure out time travel — real neat trick, that, right out of a  _ Buck Rogers  _ comic. But no matter where I looked, I couldn’t really find anything about Eclipse.” 

Pierce looks like he swallowed a lemon. Real nice.

“I can only find one mention of this project, LARP —  _ Longitudinal Arc Reactor Project,  _ oh, Tony won’t like that — but there should be more than that, right? And that’s what I’m  _ really _ here for. Nat and Agent Hill have what  _ they  _ need; what  _ I  _ need, however is this: you’re going to tell me about Project Eclipse, and you’re going to tell me about Bucky.”

❖

** _A few weeks ago_ **

The Asset does not know where he is.

But then again, it is not his place to  _ know.  _ The Asset only complies.

_ Yeah yeah, whatever, punk. Fuckin’ —  _ there is a machine in front of the Asset. His handlers stand at his back with their guns and their batons held close and at the ready, but the Asset is not interested in disobeying, not right now. He looks at the machine, and it is tall and similar to the Asset’s bed, the one that is cold and hard and not quite like what other people call a bed, called  _ cryostasis, fuckin’ why punk scared  _ _ Stevie?,  _ but there are too many technicians for this to be cryostasis, and his primary handler is standing on a landing above them all, watching and watching and watching.

The Asset is to be wiped, after this.  _ Unstable, twitchy,  _ his handlers whisper, but the Asset can hear them just  _ fuckin’  _ fine.

His primary handler leans over the counter he is sitting at on the landing, and speaks into the microphone.  _ “Soldier, please step into the machine.” _

The doors to the not-cryostasis machine open, and it is very similar to cryostasis. He steps up into the machine, lets technicians and scientists strap him in, and then the doors are closing. He sees the clock hanging on the wall directly in front of him, reading 2100 hours. He can still hear his primary handler’s voice.

_ “You’ve shaped the century, Soldier. This is an important test, one to prepare you for your final mission. Once this training is do —” _

There is something wrong. 

The Asset cannot hear what his handler is saying. The not-cryostasis machine is humming, humming  _ this is not fuckin’ humming, will it shut up? What the fucking fuck Ste —  _ and the machine is not shaking, but the Asset feels as though he is being torn apart at the seams, threads pulling and pulling and pulling and  _ God I hate the seam ripper what the fuck is a seam ripper  _ and then something, everything, nothing,  _ pops — _

The Asset is standing in the middle of a street.

Cars swerve and they’re loud and bulky and the Asset doesn’t recognize them but he  _ knows  _ them and  _ what the fuck does that mean  _ and he steps out of the road and onto the sidewalk, where a man in a suit and a long coat just stares at him. The Asset thinks that maybe the only thing keeping his from gaping is the cigarette dangling from his lips.

“Well, what the fuck is that, pal? You not from ‘round here, I’m guessin’,” he scrutinizes the Asset, completely unconcerned. The Asset might be having a coronary. “Oh, you a Brit? You on leave or something?”

The Asset doesn’t know why he says it, but “‘Merican,” he chokes out. 

“Huh.” The man pats down his coat and straightens his bowler hat; he has a newspaper tucked under his arm, with the date visible in the corner. “Well, best be on my way. Neat trick you did there.”

He steps around the Asset and moves on without looking back.

_ April 13, 1942. _

❖

** _Now_ **

“There is no Project Eclipse; it hasn’t even gone beyond testing, yet,” Pierce argues.

“And how long ago did you first use Sergeant Barnes as a test subject for this Project?”

Pierce doesn’t reply. Steve can wait him out. 

Pierce sighs. “It was three weeks ago.”

Steve starts to laugh. He laughs and laughs and laughs, and it must be driving Sam and Nat insane on the other side of the mirror and not in here with him, but — he must look like a madman, sitting across from Alexander Pierce, Secretary of Defense and leader of HYDRA, laughing his sorry patriotic ass off. “Three weeks,” he wheezes, when he can finally catch a breath. “It only took three weeks for this project to bite you in the ass. That almost makes my 70 years worth it.”

“Excuse me?”

“You know where you sent him, three weeks ago, Pierce? You sent him all the way back to 1942, right to me. You sent him home. And in 1943 I stepped into that tank knowing that whatever was going to happen, whatever pain Project Rebirth put me through, it would be worth it, because getting to the other side meant being able to put a bullet in your head.”

Pierce goes pale, and Steve can’t figure out why, until — “It wasn’t — we weren’t  _ sending _ him anywhere. We were just getting his body acclimatized to the energy levels the machine would produce.”

_ Oh my fucking God, that’s even better. Eat shit, Pierce. _

❖

** _A few weeks ago_ **

_ You burn the world, Stevie. But no one can know.  _

_ No one can know. No one can fucking know, punk, I’m fuckin’ scared,  _ _ Stevie, _ _ Steve?  _ The Asset blinks and is back in the machine. He is not surprised; he had been feeling nauseous and tired, no matter how much Stevie had combed his hair and had him drink water, and the Asset knew that he would be leaving, that his handlers would come to collect him. But Stevie promised that he will bring the Asset home, and maybe that will be soon. The Asset is due to be wiped, soon, too, and  _ fuck fuck fuck Stevie, fuck  _ now that it has been delayed a few more days his handlers will be angry, they will be furious, the Asset knows that they have their guns and their batons and the doors to the machine are opening.

_ “That wasn’t so hard, was it, Soldier?” _

What. What? His handler is wearing the same suit as when the Asset first stepped into the machine. The clock on the wall says it is 21:05.

They do not believe that the Asset went anywhere. It makes sense, since the Asset had not been briefed before stepping into the machine. 

_ “Follow the technicians to the chair, Soldier. You have an important mission to complete soon, and we will be moving you to another location.” _

The chair.  _ The Chair.  _

The Asset’s body shuts down, like it usually does at the mention of the chair. He begins to sweat, and his limbs feel heavy. He is manhandled down from the machine, and he follows the technicians blindly down the hall to the showers. 

_ No one can know, Stevie.  _ The Asset knows that this is true.  _ No one can know.  _

I _ cannot know.  _

If the Asset knows, then somehow his handlers will find out. They will know. They will order the Asset to tell the truth, and the Asset has to comply,  _ you are the fist of HYDRA, hail HYDRA, fuckin’ punk  _ but the Asset knows that no one can know.

_ Stevie. Stevie, how long until you come?  _

Does it matter? Will it matter? No one can know. 

The Asset is being prepped for the chair. To be wiped.  _ Clean slate, mission ready, ready ready ready to comply. _

He is led to the chair, and his arms and legs are strapped down. He is given a strip of leather to save his teeth from breaking. He takes a deep breath.

One of his technicians eyes him warily. “Why is he so fucking calm? Usually we have to have a STRIKE team in here.”

Another technician shrugs. “Who knows? Maybe the energy levels in the LARP machine made him dopey.”

“Not like there’s much in there anymore, anyways,” someone else says from behind the Asset. “I still can’t fucking believe it’s called  _ LARP.” _

The first technician is still watching the Asset. “What the hell is going on in your brain?”

_ Nothing,  _ the Asset thinks. Because no one can know.  _ Stevie. Stevie, doll, sweetheart, punk. Captain America and the Jaws of Death. Burn it all down. You burn it down. _

_ You burn and burn and burn and burn — _

“Initiating in 3, 2, 1 —” 

❖

** _Now_ **

“Execution doesn’t really seem like your style, Cap.”

Steve laughs. “That is one thing that’s worked to my advantage,” he says. “All the history books are about  _ Captain America. _ No one cares about little Stevie Rogers. You think you know how many people I killed in the war  _ only _ because they had their guns aimed at Bucky?

“So go on. I want to know what the plan with Project Eclipse was, and I need to know where the machine is.”

❖

“Project Eclipse is meant to be post-Insight cleanup,” Pierce starts. “Once the helicarriers were up and synced and began shooting down targets, we were going to have the Asset eliminate himself, as well as a few other hostiles to ease HYDRA’s fight in the future.”

_ Hate  _ — and Steve only recognizes because it’s what he felt that first time he found the Winter Soldier in 1942 — threatens to overwhelm him, and he knows, he  _ fucking knows  _ that Pierce wants to rile him up, that this is going to be one hell of a fucking conversation, it’s going to test all of his limits and push all of his buttons and  _ look, Natasha, I can be an adult about all of this, I can handle this rationally. _

“You’re probably thinking that by  _ hostiles  _ we mean Agent Carter, or Howard Stark, even — but that was already taken care of, you know — but time travel is tricky. We had to be very strategic about who we got rid of, and when. It’s not an easy decision to make,” Pierce tells him, and Steve can see the mask slipping back on, can hear the way condescension and arrogance colour the words he says and the tone of voice he uses. “And of everything that we could have chosen to help us solidify our power in this age, it is — of course — you, Captain.”

“But we couldn’t kill you before you became Captain America; that would mean that the bombs would have landed in New York, most likely, and we couldn’t kill you when you were on tour with the USO for the same reasons. We needed those bombs to be stopped, because Schmidt was an idiot. He didn’t have any kind of vision,” he leans back in his chair. “I, on the other hand,” he smiles, detached and patient and reminding Steve of a snake. “I had a vision. I had  _ plans.  _ I knew how to make HYDRA rule without ever letting people become aware of it.

“But you’re still an obstacle. So, I came up with the perfect solution: have the Soldier go back to 1945, locate the wreckage of the Valkyrie, and dig you out. The Soldier would kill you, throw your body back into the ocean, and then kill himself and join you.” Pierce’s smile is genuine, this time, and he appears to be incredibly pleased with himself. “That way, HYDRA is still allowed to thrive in SHIELD over the second half of the century, the Soldier still completes all of assassinations, and you’re never found.”

Steve hopes that whatever his face is doing, it’s unreadable. His comm crackles in his ear.  _ “Alright, we knew he was going to be nuts. Get a fucking grip, Steve.” _

Steve had mostly forgotten that he’s wearing it.

_ They were going to make Bucky dig me out of the ice, put a bullet or two in my brain, kick me back into the ocean and then do the same thing to himself. What the fucking fuck, this good for nothing piece of — _

_ “Steve.” _

_ Right, back on the fucking topic.  _ “And so now what?”

_ “I’m coming in there.” _

Pierce smiles, all teeth. “Now nothing. Congratulations, Captain, you’ve thwarted HYDRA for a second time.”

“You sure you don’t want to tell me the location of the time machine?”

The smile doesn’t budge. “No can do, unfortunately.”

Steve hums, feigning disappointment. From the way Pierce’s smile twitches, it’s a bit much. “Well, that would have been the easy way out, I guess.”

“Excuse me?”

The door to the interrogation room opens, and Natasha steps inside. She smiles sweetly at Pierce. “That was a real interesting story you told, Secretary. I hope you don’t mind me asking you to tell it again — with a few more details, however.”

❖

Natasha manages to drag the information from Pierce after a couple more hours of intense interrogation, all with Steve in the room; Nat had asked with a weighted look if he really wanted to be a part of it, but didn’t object when he stayed in his seat. Nat settled with a hip on the table, looking down on Pierce. 

As soon as the location of the base passed Pierce’s lips, Steve knew that Fury and Hill would be on it, trying to put together a team to go over immediately. Steve didn’t really care.

“Thank you for your cooperation,” Natasha is telling Pierce with a smile. “You’ve been a wonderful help.”

Pierce glares up at her, heaving. She ignores him.

“You gonna be ok in here?” she asks Steve as she steps towards the door.

“Don’t worry about it, Nat.” 

Once the door  _ snicks  _ closed behind her, Steve turns back to Pierce. He picks up the pistol from where it’s been lying on the table for the past few hours and lets himself feel the weight of it. 

He looks back up at Pierce. He is watching Steve with a blank expression.

“Well,” he says, cocking the gun. “I can’t honestly say that it’s been a pleasure, Pierce.”

❖

**COME HOME**

❖

“We have a team on the way to the base in Syracuse, already, we’re only waiting on you, Rogers.” Hill says, already dressed in tac gear and walking towards him. 

“What are you waiting on me for, Agent?” Steve is planning on leaving, yes, but he’s not going to find that fucking machine.

She frowns at him. “You’re coming with us.”

“Nope. I’ve got something else I need to do.”

She looks at him incredulously. “You just spent five hours interrogating Pierce and then you shot him in the face. All because of this machine. What do you mean you’re not coming with us?”

Natasha and Sam watch from the other side of the locker-slash-storage room where they’re all gearing up. Steve can understand why Hill just assumed he was coming with them, since he’s also changing into his stealthsuit, but — 

“I have a prior commitment.” He doesn’t know what else to say without explicitly stating that  _ yeah, I’m going to go meet my husband in a super-secret Romanova safehouse, all amenities included: which means that no one in SHIELD will find us. Then I’m planning on retiring. _

“A prior commitment,” she says, monotone.

Natasha, clearly fed up with Steve’s act, heaves a sigh. “We’ll take care of the base. I’ve already called Tony and let him know what’s up.”

Steve gives Natasha the most convincing  _ thank you so fucking much,  _ and  _ how fucking could you  _ expression he can, and she rolls her eyes. “Steve,” she says seriously. “I’ll take care of the machine.”

Which means that Natasha will destroy it before Hill can take it in for Fury. 

“Is that in return for telling Tony?”

She smiles at him. “Of course not.”

He knows it’s not, at least for the most part; he looks over at Sam. “You going with them?”

“If they’ll have me,” he looks over at Hill, who nods her consent. “Then yeah, I’m in.”

“You’re a good man, Sam.”

“Hey, like I said: Captain America needs my help. That’s a perfectly good reason to get back in the game.”

_ If you say so, pal.  _ But it forms an idea in Steve’s mind, and he tucks it away for later. 

❖

Tony is fucking  _ pissed. _

Steve had been twenty minutes into his drive back to the safe-house when his phone started buzzing in his pocket — since there are only a handful of people who actually even have this number, he figures it’s important enough to pull over and answer it. The screen reads  _ STARK,  _ and Steve holds back a sigh.  _ So not ready for this conversation. _

He slides his thumb over the  _ answer _ button.

_ “Alright, so first off, Jarvis. Fuck you. Fuck! When did I program you to keep secrets like this? I thought I made sure you didn’t get any of my bad genes.” _

_ [“My apologies, sir, but Captain Rogers and I were only working together as per the privacy protocols you have set up for all of the Avengers.”] _

_ “Right, ok, I get that, probably my fault, and I would really like a drink.” _

“Tony,” Steve cuts him off, trying to keep up with having a three-way phone call. He figures he may as well just cut right to the chase. “I’m sorry.”

There is a pause.  _ “Wow,” _ Tony says, almost breathless, and Steve rolls his eyes.  _ “Wow,”  _ he says again.  _ “Can you repeat that? Just once. I want to hear it again.” _

“No, you had your chance. Jarvis, please delete the recording.”

_ [“Of course, Captain.”] _

_ “Woah, excuse me? What was that? He didn’t even use any kind of password.” _

_ [“Captain Rogers did say ‘please’, sir.”] _

_ “That’s not a password, J.” _

_ [“No, it is not. It’s manners, and common courtesy.”]  _

_ “Oh,” _ Tony gasps.  _ “Ouch.” _

“Tony,” Steve cuts in again, and no fucking wonder he tries not to call Tony when he doesn’t have to. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

He must hear the edge in Steve’s voice, so he stops bickering with Jarvis to tune back in. “Shoot, Capsicle.”

“I need a place to stay.  _ Bucky _ and I need a place to stay,” he corrects himself. “Just for a little white, we have a plan, but before that — I understand if you don’t want to —”

_ “I’ve seen everything, Cap.” _ Tony says, voice forcefully cheerful.  _ “I know what we’re getting into.” _

“Tony,” Steve doesn’t really know what to say. 

_ “It’s fine, Cap! Totally fine. You know. I mean, I’m sure that it’s not actually  _ totally _ fine, but I’ve talked it out with J, Mr. Secret-Keeper, and Pepper is always ‘do what you think is best, Tony,’ which, excuse me, does not qualify as helpful at all —” _

_ [“Perhaps we should give Captain Rogers an answer, Sir.”] _

_ “Jeesus! When did you get so pushy. J, I love you, but you hang out too much with Pep.” _

“Tony, I don’t want to rush you, but —”

_ “Yes,” _ he sighs.  _ “You and Robocop can hide out in the tower for a little bit. Keep to your floor and I’ll keep everyone else away.” _

Steve nearly collapses in relief.  _ “Thank you.” _

❖

“Come on, Buck,” he says, and Bucky rises from his perch on the couch without a word. “We’re going back to New York for a minute.”

❖

**EPILOGUE**

❖

** _One month later_ **

The house in the mountains is quiet. 

The Asset —  _ enjoys —  _ the quiet. The quiet lets him hear when  Stevie wakes up, when he stumbles into the kitchen to make coffee,  _ two milk, one sugar, Buck, jerk, doll, you like drinking it that way,  _ what does that mean,  Stevie?, and the Asset can hear the birds begin to sing while he can smell the coffee beginning to brew and the Asset believes that the uncomfortable feeling he experiences is  _ contentment, _ not happiness, because the Asset thinks he remembers  _ happiness,  _ and  Steve hasn’t smiled much lately, sometimes, but not a lot, and the Asset wants to hear him  _ laugh.  _

_ Wants, wants, want to hear Stevie laugh. Was that happiness? _

❖

_ [Enjoy retirement, old man. Keep in touch, wash your fucking dishes :)] _

A month has gone by. Captain America was injured in the fall of SHIELD and HYDRA, and is taking a break to recuperate and will be taking a more behind-the-scenes role from now on, bar end of the world crisis’. 

Steve Rogers, on the other hand, is in hiding with the love of his fucking life, trying to piece their lives back together. 

The end of the line is one giant puzzle. They’ve both been at war so long that the idea of  _ coming _ home has always been like a pick-up line, a real nice dream, a painting they might go see at the gallery and think  _ wow, well ain’t that nice? Look at all of those colours and the warmth and the domesticity of it all. A million bucks, that painting’s worth. Double that, triple that, it’s completely fucking out of my Great Depression budget, pal. _

The house that Steve purchased with Natasha’s help is nice. It’s a cottage, old but well-maintained. In the middle of nowhere, but not in the same way that The Bum-Fucking-Nowhere Box was; this cottage has signs of life, wrinkles in the couch cushions and dishes in the sink and the floorboards creak. There are no  _ Twenty-First Fucking Century 101  _ binders lying around, and the sun still manages to stream through the windows in the evening, fighting through the curtain of trees surrounding the cottage. 

It’s nice.

Real fucking nice, even though both he and Bucky have nightmares, both clearly want to physically comfort each other but don’t know how. They’re trying to say too much without actually saying anything at all, and the tension between them is pulled so taught that it’s bound to snap soon, and Steve doesn’t know how that’s going to affect them.

He knows that Buck doesn’t really sleep, that he doesn’t really know what to do with himself, and he also knows that Buck isn’t quite  _ Buck  _ yet, either. But that’s ok, Steve knew that,  _ he fucking knew that,  _ but god does he just want to go over there and hold him and cry his fucking heart out, and sometimes he thinks that Buck wants that too. 

They always sit together in the morning, and he’ll put two milk and one sugar in Buck’s coffee, and two sugar and one milk in his own, and it’s nice to sit and enjoy each other’s presence. 

“Mornin, doll,” he says, every morning, and sometimes Bucky will smile at him.

❖

It’s a nightmare unlike the others, because Bucky’s screams are what wake Steve up.  _ He never screams, he is always so quiet,  _ Steve throws himself out of bed and goes to Bucky in the room across the hall. 

Bucky has shoved himself into the corner of his bed, pressed into the wall; his chest is heaving and his eyes are wild, but he isn’t screaming anymore. 

“Buck?” Steve steps into the room cautiously. “Bucky.”

Bucky breathes in and holds it for a few seconds, letting it out in a rush. He forces his face into his knees, pulling at his hair while he takes another deep breath. “Stevie.”

“Can I come in, Buck?”

He shifts over on the bed as an answer, and Steve crawls up to sit next to him; he’s surprised when Bucky immediately falls into his lap, sighing against his stomach. Steve is reminded of the last time this happened, in 1942; he runs his fingers through Bucky’s hair.

❖

** _1942_ **

_ "You know me. I know you?" His hair is long and his eyes are flat; the breaths he takes are shallow and pained. _

_ "I know you Buck." Steve traces the ridges of flesh that make up Bucky's shoulder and back, heart breaking at the seam of muscle and bone and blood and metal. But then amongst the destruction he finds something small: a little white line; it was a broken bottle from a back alley scuffle and laughter buried into the side of Steve's neck, breathless and fond and the past, present, and future. "Always." _

❖

** _Now_ **

“You were smaller,” Bucky says, almost a whisper.

“Does it bother you?” Steve asks, running a hand down Bucky’s spine.

“No,” he huffs, and then sighs. “I know you. Every version of you.”

Steve smiles down at him, completely enthralled, because it’s true. “I want to know every version of you, Buck.”

Bucky turns to look up at Steve and he smiles, just a little crinkle at the corner of his eyes but it’s  _ there  _ and oh,  _ god — _

“Stay?”

“Yeah,” he chokes out, barely. “I’ll stay, doll."

❖

** _Two months later_ **

“Did you ask me to marry you?” 

Steve, Stevie, Captain America — Stevie looks at him, at Bucky,  _ because yeah ok I can be Bucky, I  _ am _ Bucky,  _ and Bucky wants. Bucky still wants, he wants to know if that’s something real, that he’s not making it up. Steve is glued to his side from shoulder to hip to feet stuck in between his legs and goddammit  _ why are his feet so cold,  _ and Bucky is running his hand down Steve’s back and he can hear his own voice saying  _ who knows what the future will bring? _

The future is now and the future was 1950, 1960, 70, 80, 90 —  _ what are we gonna do now, Stevie? _

“Yes,” Steve tells him. “I did.”

He rolls and now Steve is on top of Bucky and he’s a weight that grounds him, and it doesn’t feel like a cage, it feels ike relief because he’s so fuckin’ safe under Steve and there is no where else that he would rather be and isn’t that something, to  _ know _ that, now. 

“Was it just like this?” He has a feeling that it was, a moment tucked under blankets and whispered to each other when no one else was allowed to hear.

“Yeah, doll,” and he kisses Bucky’s bare shoulder. “Almost the exact same.”

“Not quite,” he says, and he feels so soft and his head is clearer than it’s been in a long time and — “I can say yes, now, can’t I?”

Bucky feels Steve’s laughter before he hears it — it’s something Bucky wants more of, too, he decides. He feels Steve shake, feels the puff of breath on his chest, feels his hands squeeze involuntarily where they hold Bucky’s sides. He almost wishes that Steve’s face had been flat on his chest, too, so he could feel the way his smile spreads and lights up his face; but then he wouldn’t have been able to see it properly. 

“Are you asking me to marry  _ you, _ Buck? Or are you saying yes to my seventy year old proposal?”

Bucky traces Steve’s nose with a metal finger, and Steve doesn’t flinch, never flinches.  _ Does it matter?  _

❖

“I thought that I had saved you, that first time in Azzano.” It’s something that Steve has never said aloud, even though he knows that the few people who know the truth now have probably thought it. “I was — so  _ glad,”  _ and thinking about how they had to go through all of that anyways, to get  _ here, _ makes him so fucking — 

“So what?” Bucky cuts him off. “You rescued me, and we had time together, and then I fell. Then you crashed a plane full of  _ bombs _ into the  _ Arctic.” _

That’s the most expression Steve has heard in Bucky’s voice since they showed up. He turns his head so that he’s looking at Bucky’s profile. “Sometimes I can’t believe the unfairness of it all; everything we had to go through to get here.”

He narrows his eyes at Steve, every single line on his face spelling  _ yeah this conversation ain’t over, pal.  _ “Yeah, what the flyin’ fuck, Stevie.”

Steve sighs, looking back up at the ceiling. “That’s all you have to say about it?  _ Fuck?  _ I remember you used to be more eloquent than that, Barnes. Charming, even.”

“Oh yeah? Well, I don’t remember you at all. Punk.”

Steve snorts. “But you still asked me to marry you.”

Bucky reaches over and laces his fingers with Steve’s. “I don’t remember you  _ much,” _ he corrects, softly. “But I know you,” he traces Steve’s nose, his lips, his jaw. “And I trust you. You burned the world for me, just because I asked you to.”

“You never need to ask me to do that, Buck. Not if it’s for you.”

❖

** _Four months later_ **

“There’s this play,  _ Roi Ubu,”  _ Steve starts — 

“ — and you were all over it for a while, right? Not the play, because it was hot garbage, but the art.” Bucky puts down the book he was working on, but Steve knew he hadn’t actually read a word in fifteen minutes. He always knows when Steve has something he needs to say, so he waits him out.

“It was powerful,” he explains, and Bucky hums in agreement. “I remember reading it and thinking about the chaos that it caused. But more and more I think about what Yeats had to say about it, because yeah the play is a mess, but it’s one with  _ purpose —” _

“What did Yeats say about it?” Bucky frowns at him. Steve goes over to him and sits down, takes Bucky’s left hand in his and threads their fingers together. 

“He said,  _ ‘After S. Mallarmé, after Verlaine, after G. Moreau, after Puvis de Chavannes, after our own verse, after the faint mixed tins of Conder, what more is possible? After us the Savage God.’ _

“I think about that quote a lot. Life wasn’t easy, but it was softer. We were so much fucking softer. We had each other, and our four walls and single bed and when you danced with me I would think  _ I could never be happier,  _ but then you spun me around the room again and I  _ was _ happier. 

“Back then, when I first read that quote, I thought it was  _ just _ about anger. But now I can see it as a mission. Tension, in everything we do. It’s a challenge.  _ What more is possible? _ We had a good life, Buck, and someone decided that we didn’t deserve it. So fuck them.  _ We are the savage god. _ It’s… vengeance. It’s redemption. It’s anger and passion and a new age. 

They tore down our home, and fuck them for thinking we wouldn’t just stand right back up and build again.”

When Steve turns to look at Bucky, he’s met with a smile and a fond look in his eye. “You’re a real dramatic kind of fella, you know that?” He reaches up with his right hand to cup Steve’s cheek. “But god I missed you.”

And Steve doesn’t think, because he  _ knows,  _ just like the same way Bucky just suddenly  _ knows  _ things, and when he leans in, Bucky is already there waiting for him. 

He’s warm and relaxed and they’re both finally fucking  _ home _ in this little cottage in the mountains and Bucky’s kiss is slow and deep and every nerve is singing because he’s  _ so fucking happy —  _ Bucky moves away from his lips, and Steve breathes a little  _ oh,  _ but then Bucky is back and he’s kissing Steve’s cheeks and his nose, and then his forehead, and he keeps going until Steve is laughing and telling him to  _ stop, Buck, why you gotta be the biggest fucking sap in the twentieth  _ and _ the twenty-first century —  _

Steve leans away, but he doesn’t go very far; Bucky keeps him close, running a hand down Steve’s back. 

“You think we can build our home out here?” Bucky asks, quiet. “You think we can be happy out here?”

Steve holds Bucky’s face between his palms. “I think that I want to  _ try.  _ We can do it, doll, I know it.”

“Well, we’ve got our whole future, I guess. It’s a big place. Who knows what’ll bring?”

And it would have broken Steve’s heart, to hear Bucky say that before, but now — “I don’t know what the future will bring, Buck.”

It’s true. Steve doesn’t know, not beyond  _ him and Bucky, safe and loved and at home.  _ He doesn’t know, and it feels like a gift. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you guys for sticking around. It's been a joy participating in this fest, and I would like to give a huge shout out to Penn and Peach and Lenne for being awesome friends and betas and collaborators. Thank you mods for running the fest!
> 
> Comments and kudos are always appreciated

**Author's Note:**

> Any street names and addresses used are made up, and any similarities are completely coincidental. 
> 
> There will be three chapters, updated on Fridays. 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! Comments and Kudos are always appreciated.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Art] Finally Home](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23403757) by [Call_Me_Kayyyyy (Cheeky9274)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cheeky9274/pseuds/Call_Me_Kayyyyy)


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